Oil & Fuel California's Tough new rules for Diesel Engines

[sandman2234]

A possibility would be to have the imports pay for the enviromental impacts that are being shoved down our throats if they don't adhere to them themselves. That would benefit them to adhere, or cost them enough that we could offset the manufacture in this country and do it within some sort of clean limits. However that would take a politician with some sort of agenda that could actually get passed.
David from jax

 

[Z-Michigan]

I think it would be a GREAT idea to have imports meet our environmental standards at their plants back home, or else pay a huge duty to compensate. I think most european imports would meet the standards, but not all from Japan and hardly anything from other Asian countries. Unfortunately our evil masters have pretty much sold us down the river with WTO, NAFTA, and a ton of other bad, bad, bad treaties and laws that screw 90% of americans so the top 1% can get richer.

 

[SLOBuds]

I have friends who think it is impolite to discuss politics at the dinner table. I have other friends who think that political conversation is the highest form of entertainment while dining. (But only when the group is making fun of the OTHER side, mind you.)

Anyway.

I just have one warning to everyone: whatever you do, do NOT move to California and do NOT visit California on vacations. Especially the central coast.

 

[Bob_Young]

If CAL has some tough air pollution spots that need strong measures, I suppose action needs to be taken. Mandating these same measures to windblown heights elsewhere in the state seems an easy-out for the politician that makes things tough for everyone else. Not the way our system is supposed to work.

With NY fancying itself an "environmental activist state", I know these rules will be applied here sooner or later with the same disregard for the populace. With Upstate NY already an economic backwater (but with clean air & water); I'm sure more environmentalism is the answer (to making our backwater status permanent).

Where all the meddling is headed:
Classical Values :: When failure to police yourself against crimes you haven't committed becomes a crime

For the record, I have no problem with this as an option. I have a huge problem when it becomes mandatory...and it will if we just quietly sit back and accept everything that comes along.

Some of the comments are good.
Bob

 

[Green is Keen]

I have friends who think it is impolite to discuss politics at the dinner table. I have other friends who think that political conversation is the highest form of entertainment while dining. (But only when the group is making fun of the OTHER side, mind you.)

I must say that this is without a doubt one of the most entertaining threads I've yet to read on any message board. My sides are aching....

I was born in Southern California and moved to the Pacific Northwest to get away from all the silly people and ideas. Unfortunately I found more California Transplants in Washington and Oregon than native Webfoots....

I still travel to California several time a year for business and jump up & down on The Fault Line when I leave to no avail. But when I get home it makes me so happy to say "California a great place to be from, far away from".

 

[SLOBuds]

GreenKeen: you are one of the smart ones that everyone else should pay heed to! Get the H out of California except for those times when you are forced to spend vacation and investment dollars there!

My travel takes me to Rapid City, Long Island, Melbourne Florida, and Dallas. Then my company forces me back to the 'C' word and all those bad things start happening all over again to me.

Technology has made our world smaller and smaller, something that isn't all that comfortable for us. Finding out about collapsing bridges, 12 minutes after the incident, only makes my wife anxious towards driving over bridges. Seeing the effect of globalization (eg, cheap labor which transports itself from country to country) makes me understand that it is good for some and bad for others - one of those 'others' may be my son and my grandson.

At the end of our journey, though, it's hard to believe there is a better place to live than where we are. Our sons could indeed have less than the generation before them. But there is nowhere else that allows them to achieve wonders either. As long as the horrible laziness does not creep into our culture (as it did with all of the other successful cultures now fallen), our future sons will have wonderful opportunities to thrive.

I am hopeful and fearful of the future. But heck, those hopes and fears were probably felt by all of our forefathers. In fact, reading the marvelous works of our forefathers you do see excitement and wonder at their grand experiment. And you also see fear towards the unknowns. I myself still believe that my son will succeed as long as he applies himself, which he does. And all the sons after him.

Actually, the nicest thing about America is that you don't really need to have possessions to be considered successful and be happy. Hard to find that anywhere else. Not impossible ... just hard.

I don't know much about cleaner diesel engines required in California. My neighbor is a commercial fisherman. He received a grant which allowed him to have a brand new diesel engine for free. Apparently with significantly lower emissions that his old engine. I was somewhat unhappy with the fact that he was forced to destroy his old engine. I thought it was a waste of resources that could be used effectively in one of our neighboring countries. But anyway, those were the rules apparently.

Let's see now. For closure let me correct all of my non-politically-correct terminologies in true Californian fashion:

'Son' should actually be 'All children which are borne of my union with another person, either male or female, with or without sanction of governmental authorities, but otherwise recognized by my community and the universe as a child of mine.'

'Wife' = person with whom I co-habituate on a regular though undefined period of time.

'Grandson' = See 'son', above, but with younger carbon dating within the universe.

'Forefathers' = A criminal office to say that word in California.

'Fisherman' = 'Fisherman.' They refuse to change the title of what they are called, and will be the 'last to go'.

Great conversation about diesel engines and whatnots!

 

[zzvyb6]

The real reason for the smog rule change is to increase the number of used and smog illegal machines that can be used by illegal immigrants in their landscape businesses. All the legals will buy new. Their used machines will go to whereever the undocumenteds can get to them. Since the illegals don't get their machinery checked at registration time, its a great way to force an inventory upgrade and provide the underground economy with resources. It has nothing to do with air quality.

 

[daTeacha]

SLObuds -- Here in Ohio, those who fish for sport are now sometimes called simply "fishers" so as not discriminate against anyone by age, sex, race, last name, sexual preference, species, or whatever. So far no one has confused the human "fishers" with the like named member of the weasel family, but probably only because the latter are not native to the state. Those who catch fish commercially and try to make something resembling an honest living from it are basically an endangered species in their own right. The state is busily trying to buy up their licenses, which cannot be passed to new owners when the current commercial operator goes to that great fish pond in the sky. Eventually the only kind of fishing in Ohio will be for sport or on farms, both of which contribute significantly more to the state economy than the persons who run their diesel powered boats around in Lake Erie.

Sooner or later though, someone will figure out that all those pleasure boats, charter boats, the trucks and SUVs that pull them, the cars that carry the fishers from inland locales to the lake and back, the trucks that carry food for restaurants, bait, fishing gear, outboard fuel, inboard fuel, marine diesel, etc. in the tourist and fishing areas, and so on are in fact contributing much more pollution to our atmosphere than the entire fleet of dirty diesel powered commercial boats did in its heyday, and the whole process will start to be reversed. What goes around ....

 

[Yankee Clipper]

As I understand the law, new off highway equipment must meet the new regs. The old equipment is "grandfathered" and exempted.

I daresay there will be incentives to repower the old units with cleaner engines or take them out of service but many older machines still lead useful lifes everyday doing what they were designed to do.