Weekend Open Thread
by Elisa
Fri Apr 25, 2008 at 06:18:00 AM PDT
Check out this Today story about the world's youngest college professor. Alia Sabur is a 19-year-old professor at Konkuk University in Korea. The New York native started reading at 8-months-old and attended college when she was 10.
And I fretted about Ari starting preschool too young! Still, Sabur seems to be a very mature and well-adjusted adult.
Old Car Vs. New Hybrid: With all this talk surrounding the new "green" economy and the jobs it will spur, something I have always wondered if we will become less environmentally friendly in buying more stuff -- like a hybrid car. As it turns out, we may indeed win -- and Mother Nature will thank us -- in upgrading sputtering, old cars for a hybrid, according to Pablo Paster of Salon's "Ask Pablo" green column.
This is a question I have gotten a lot, and one that I have wondered about myself. You see a modern-day tie-dye aficionado puttering along the highway in his VW van with black smoke spewing out the back, and you have to wonder if we wouldn't all be better off if he traded it in for a Prius. The consensus among some environmentalists -- perhaps ones who drive late-'60s Mustangs -- seems to be that driving your old car creates significantly less pollution than the manufacture of a new car. I wish it were that easy...
Given that your car is already built, we can write off the energy used in making it. We can also write off the emissions that it has already created from burning gasoline. That means that over the next 116,000 miles, your car's greenhouse gas emissions will essentially break even with the emissions from the production and use of a Prius. I'm guessing your 22-year-old car probably has over 200,000 miles on it. If you're lucky, you can get another few years out of it. So if you can afford a new Prius, you are better off switching now. And think of the fewer hassles of owning a new car.
Another thing to keep in mind are the nitrogen oxides produced by cars. Nitrogen oxides are a key component of smog, which as we know contributes to asthma, heart disease and many other health and environmental concerns. In the early '80s, the nitrogen oxide standard for cars was 1 gram per mile, or 12 kg per year, whereas cars are now required to achieve lower than 0.4 grams per mile, or 4.8 kg per year. Cars older than your Mercedes are even dirtier. A new vehicle like a Prius can reduce toxic air emissions of pre-catalytic converter cars by more than 80 percent.
Of course, the answer is not so easy in comparing an "old" newish car like an SUV and wanting to upgrade to a Prius. In that case, the owner would simply pass on the burden to another consumer unless s/he scraps it.
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