Bicycles Can End Bad Weather

“extreme droughts, heat waves, forest fires and floods the world is currently experiencing will likely continue to worsen for at least the next 30 years.”

Tackling Climate Change One Ride at a Time | PeopleForBikes

About Tony Heller

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18 Responses to Bicycles Can End Bad Weather

  1. Peter Carroll says:

    Not so! Riding bicycles and the additional exertion, results in increased respiration therefore more human CO2 “emisssions”. This is entirely counterproductive when compared to the gentle respiration involved with driving a car, or even a leisurely stroll.

    In addition, I doubt whether the proponents of bicycle riding have taken into account the increase in other “effluvium”, released as a result of the increased exertion and metabolic rate in the human digestive tract.

    • Greg in NZ says:

      True that: travelled through Ch!na in 1986 when they re-opened to the world (solo, not in a tour group) and apart from buses, trains, boats – and black limos for the bosses – everyone rode bicycles or walked.

      Now that the ‘Middle Kingdom’ has leapt way ahead into the 21st century, Greens, Karens, and schoolgirls want us to return to those ‘communist’ means of transport to like, I mean, y’know, literally ‘save the planet’.

      I have no problem with warmth, the more the merrier! But at my age, my 4×4 diesel van suits me fine, and the planet’s been here longer than me.

    • Jack the Insider says:

      The other unintended consequence of bicycles occurs when progressive city councils (good luck finding a city council that isn’t progressive) convert roads, or portions of roads, designed for cars into bike lanes. These bike lanes invariable don’t get used much but cause the remnant portion left for cars and trucks to become ever more grid locked. And of course, with grid locking, or even just slowing of vehicle traffic flow, fuel consumption and emission of CO2 must increase. The nett effect of bike lanes, even if it encourages a handful of courageous punters to take to the bike, has to be an increase in CO2 emissions not a decrease.

      • Allan Shelton says:

        Yes. And thus the increase in CO2 emissions will prove beneficial.
        Increased planet earth greening, crop yields, etc., etc., etc.

  2. arn says:

    Then chinas capital must have the best climate in the world.
    According to Katie Melua there were 9 mio bicycles in Beijing 2 decades ago.
    At the same time the city was foggy all day long as result of smog.

  3. D. Boss says:

    Peter Carroll has it correct above. Humans respirating are far worse than cars, planes and trains in terms of CO2 emissions per passenger mile! Here’s the figures:

    Human Walking = 0.442 lbs CO2 per passenger mile
    (note bicycle riding is at double the speed of walking, but respiration rate also doubles, so bicycle riding would be the same CO2 per passenger mile as walking)

    Boeing 777 with 400 passengers = 0.181 lbs CO2 per passenger mile
    Car with 4 passengers = 0.221 lbs CO2 per passenger mile
    Boeing 737-800 with 160 passengers = 0.222 lbs CO2 per passenger mile
    Boeing 747-400 with 400 passengers = 0.239 lbs CO2 per passenger mile
    (US) passenger train with 150 passengers = 0.293 lbs CO2 per passenger mile

    So the above modes of transport are half the CO2 emission of average humans walking. And below is a long range business jet, which is only double that of humans walking!

    Gulfstream G550 with 14 passengers = 0.976 lbs CO2 per passenger mile

    This not some copy and paste bullchips. I went into the actual chemistry of combustion, worked out the rate of CO2 product of the fuel’s chemistry, obtained the typical fuel burn, speed, and passengers and worked out the values empirically from actual data. And note both the B737 and B747 are using older turbofan engines, while the 777 uses newer far more fuel efficient engines and you can see the difference.

    Also CO2 is NOT the climate control knob, water vapor is. Water vapor is 2-3x more powerful than CO2, pound per pound. And in colder regions it is around 9-11,000 ppm and in warmer regions like here in S Florida, it averages 22,000-25,000 ppm on an annual basis. That means (natural) water vapor is 50-110 times more greenhousy than CO2

    • arn says:

      Quite the effort Sir.

      Even if it were the control knob (and it is not) It is highly unlikely that CO2 is starts going nuts at almost 0 or 0.04% as in this case.
      The chance is about 1 :10 and even worse :
      Everything is fine for climate up until 0.035% but then – Apocalypse.

      Things don’t scale that way,especially not on a planet with way higher CO2 levels in the past that created the best evolutionary conditions for life ever (Cambrian and Avalon Explosion.),
      an atmosphere with magnitudes of more other greenhouse gases (at such high levels that they turn the planet blue and white),
      and a supercold neighboring red planet with a 95 %+ CO2atmosphere ( maybe CO2 joined a Union there and went on strike for a higher minimum wage and stopped doing its job until it happens)

  4. oeman50 says:

    Whenever I ride my bicycle, the weather immediately improves!

  5. Gamecock says:

    Few bike riders will ever ride enough to cover all the fossil fuel energy that went into making it.

  6. Bob G says:

    the Smithsonian has a piece on the devastating effects of increasing CO2. it causes heat cold floods droughts probably murder and suicide too and to prove all this they have a link so I went to the link and here it is. https://science.nasa.gov/climate-change/effects/. I sure hope Trump can shrink and reform our bloated government of bureaucratic BS and I sure hope he has the time and inclination to include NASA. let’s give voices to opposing opinions as we’ve already heard 40 years of BS from the other side and none of it’s come true.

  7. Bruce of Newcastle says:

    Don’t knock it, it may be silly but the result has been a proliferation of great cycling trails. This one is the latest in my state of NSW:

    Lismore to Bentley rail trail opens December 14 (21 Nov)

    That’ll be 132 km of very fine cycling and walking!

    In my town of Newcastle there’ve been a lot of excellent shared paths built, around Lake Macquarie and along the old rail and steam tram rights of way. I’m not doing riding these days but do fairly often walk the paths. It’s nice.

  8. When some middle class bully is promoting their particular brand of crankery, it is always to ‘save the planet’.

  9. conrad ziefle says:

    People have been riding their bikes like crazy in the Netherlands for years, and still the farmers are being kicked off their farms to save the environment. The bikes didn’t do much to save their culture.

  10. spren says:

    It should be a crime to be this stupid. This clown must do penance by turning big rocks into little ones, for a very long time.

  11. Richard E Fritz says:

    the SAME ship and when AL GORE announces hes using a glider to fly and boat borrowed from Greta to get to EU sure we may believe
    same SHIP different decade

  12. conrad ziefle says:

    Humans are just recycled CO2, net gain 0%. Fossil fuels are sequestered CO2, net gain 100% of the CO2, hence a contribution to the continued life of the biosphere.

  13. Bill says:

    When I think of all the decades that I spent bicycling, for fun and to work, and never once did I pat myself on the back about how I was saving the world. The world!

    Is that what the wokesters do? Are they constantly seeing themselves saving this, or combatting that, while they go about their daily lives? The clinical name for that is “narcissistic personality disorder” and it is inculcated in k-12 school, college and TV.

    • conrad ziefle says:

      It’s what the educational system has taught them, i.e. we have been so successful at diminishing the actually threats that our ancestors faced, that our children can now focus on irrelevant things.

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