Tag: lobby

there will not be a solution

…for a problem that does not yet exist, if we are bound to the behavior of a free capitalistic economical framework.

Normally the establishment does what the establishment is expected to do; they flood the media with arguments that undermine change by highlighting the yet unresolved problems that that change will bring to the light.

Here we go with all the doubts casted upon the management of battery recycling. Or with the question of where the electric power was generated and at what environmental cost. These two problems, aren’t quite yet problems, and therefore we haven’t yet solutions for them. There is no economical incentive to tackle those problems yet. But this does not mean that they cannot be solved nor that they will not be solved, come the time they need to be solved.

Staying put with internal combustion engines is preventing new problems to endure in the old ones, yet at a high cost. A mortgage for future generations.

Whilst the automotive industry is doing its best to slow down the transition to electrical mobility, other industries, with a smaller financial baggage, face problems head on. Once, a company told us we had a new huge, much bigger that electric vehicles, problem; we all want to have internet in our pockets. And do you know what? They even had a working solution on their way to the shelves!

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non-solution to a non-problem

There wasn’t apparently a problem for this solution. And demagoguery had a great time instead. 

Full-Hybrid cars do not need plugs. And they save a substantial amount on gas and emissions. 

Plug-in full-hybrids neither need plugs. And they save a substantial amount on gas and emissions too. Yet they shine if you plug them.  

So here you have a way to break the egg-and-chicken dilemma of infrastructure. First you legally enforce the exclusive sales of full-hybrid cars. Secondly you legally enforce the exclusive use of plug-in full-hybrids for fleet and company-owned cars. And infrastructure will develop of its very own market demand.

But it never happened. Perhaps the trail of money would tell why. Who would benefit of such course of action? Patent holders perhaps? For sure the health of us all. But our health is sometimes difficult to monetize. In the short term. 

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Verschlimmbesserung

So many of our attempts to improve things bring unforeseen problems in their wake. The word modestly admits how seldom progress moves in a linear manner.

Alain de Botton, The School of Life

The German minister of transportation has single-handed suddenly approved the introduction of XXL-Lorries in Germany. Likely this will roll-out in the rest of Europe—otherwise it would be meaningless. Officially, the measure is meant to reduce CO2 emissions.

I am returning to the recurrent question whether the language forms our actions. I see no possible end to this action where the environment will be better off. The market of goods transport will quickly rebalance this sudden increase of 30% load per driver and…

the winners will be:

  • Car/Truck-makers
  • Motorway contractors
  • Amazon

the losers will be:

  • the environment
  • all of us who will feel threatened by behemoths on wheels in our cities, towns and roads
  • communities and cities that will have to repair and enlarge junctions, accesses, roads

…under this considerations, I do not understand how this could be a political decision.

A political decision would be then to spur the industry—as opposite to hone the lobbyists—to come up with creative solutions like smaller-than-today-driverless lorries. Or as it is already being researched, trains of lorries with a human driven head lorry and autonomous followers.

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