On Feb 10, 11:24�pm, totallydeadmail... RemoveThis @yahoo.co.uk (The Older
Gentleman) wrote:
> They've done that. Your last pronouncement on the subject involved
> telling the world that Europe used diesels because it didn't have
> earthquakes. Do pull your head up from wherever you've stuffed it.
You need to look at the Big Picture instead of from your existential
pleasure seeking weltanschuung.
Geological landforms like tectonic plates and mountain ranges and
ocean currents and prevailing wind and rain patterns lock air
pollution into the southern half of the San Joaquin valley, which is a
huge agricultural area 800 miles long and 200 miles wide.
Farmers can only grow crops in about half that area, it's too dry on
the west side of the valley for anything except cotton. Even the
Salinas valley has its microclimates where some crops will grow and
others won't and the Santa Lucia mountains block the rain from falling
in the valley and the Salinas river sinks into the sand in futility.
Farmers farm and use diesel farm machinery and truckers truck and
diesel mechanics repair diesel trucks and diesel farm machinery and
any land along Highway 99 that doesn't have crops or cows or houses on
it looks like a huge junk yard with rows of rusting machinery waiting
to be fixed.
Or it looks like an endless RV, boat, and manufactured home sales
yard...
It will take decades to see a change in air quality from use of ultra
low sulphur diesel fuel, if it isn't already too late.
The San Joaquin valley has changed from having a navigable 100 square
mile lake in the middle to having a huge desert in the middle. This
has happened in only 150 years as forests were cleared and Sierra
creeks diverted into farmers' irrigation ditches.
We have had two or three devastating dust bowl droughts here since the
1880's. John Steinbeck, who wrote extensively about the problems of
farmers in California, discussed the deadly droughts in "To a God
Unknown".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_a_God_Unknown
The San Joaquin river has gone dry and California wants to restore it
so salmon can swim from the San Francisco bya to Kings county.
The Kern river flows down off Mount Whitney, and is absorbed into
desert sands in a huge selenium-polluted basin in Kern county. The
small oil town of Taft looks like it belongs in southern New Mexico.
The Kaweah river and Kings river drain down out of Sequoia and Kings
Canyon, and the water disappears into the ground long before it ever
reaches the middle of the valley.
The 400 square mile oak and sycamore forest in the Kaweah delta has
disappeared, there are only a few isolated groves of valley oaks left.
A few yuppies buying high performance diesel sedans and sportscars are
not going to have a huge immediate effect upon California air quality.
The diesel truck fleet is not expected to be fully replaced until
2030, and air pollution standards for diesel cars have been only
slightly relaxed for 2007 through 2009 models to make an opening for
more affordable small Japanese diesel sedans.
With all the movie stars buying hybrid electric cars, it's going to
take some major celebrities buying clean diesel sedans and bragging
that they are non-polluting to get *other* trendy celebrities to buy
clean diesel sedans, and if the clean diesel sedans don't cost $90K
trendy celebrities won't feel the need to keep up with each other,
they will buy something that proves they are rich.
As I said above, any major change in air quality is going to happen
because of ultra low sulfur diesel compliant heavy trucks, farm
machinery, railroad locomotives, electric power generating diesels and
marine engines, it won't happen because a few yuppies are buying
prestigious diesel sedans.
>> Stay informed about: Euro diesel reaches the US 
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