[nothrabannosir]

> Londoners might not dream of electric buses, …

Every single cyclist dreams of electric busses, believe you me.

Huffing nitrogen stationary-bus-fart oxides turns any public road here straight into an express lane to lung cancer, without even the courtesy of a nicotine rush.

I laugh when people say cycling is healthy. Not in London. Nooo sir. Between the long term certainty of whatever smokers like to aim for, and the short term gamble of “brain-on-asphalt syndrome”, it’s a bloody joke.

Electric busses can’t rule the streets soon enough.

[ljcn]

> I laugh when people say cycling is healthy. Not in London.

Not according to this Cambridge study two years ago. They found the health benefits of cycling in London always outweighed the risks.

http://www.mrc-epid.cam.ac.uk/blog/walking-cycling-air-pollu...

It got quite a bit of media coverage, e.g.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/may/05/benefits...

[Retric]

There where a lot of edge cases to those calculations. Including very short short commute times, specific locations within cities, background physical activity, traffic accidents etc.

Further, while 1% of cities may cross their air thresholds at their assumption levels those are the largest cities. So far more than 1% of the population would be worse off.

It's just the news glossed over the very real downsides mentioned in the study.

[jfz]

The benefits of cycling outweigh the harms of the pollution, almost everywhere. The pollution is still harmful, though, and lowers your lifespan compared to not having as much pollution.

[jeffwass]

As a London pedestrian I am fully in favour of electric buses.

The NoX fumes are horrible for pedestrians too. Especially when the buses are stacked one after another, idling.

I seriously can’t believe the government refuses to act on the diesel disaster. Tens of thousands of people die from diesel exhaust complications per year, but they don’t care.

[walshemj]

Ironically Mrs Thatcher (former chemist) questioned the dash to diesel instead of clean burn engines back when the policy of favoring diesel over petrol was being discussed.

[SaltyBackendGuy]

This reminds me of 'dieselgate'[0], it's not just buses. One does wonder why the government hasen't acted on a diesel ban (or some action) when it's clearly a risk to the public.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal

[IshKebab]

I'm pretty sure that's what he was talking about.

[fifnir]

did anyone vote for more taxes on themselves to cover the cost?

[adrianN]

How about we cover the cost from the billions of profits made by car companies selling internal combustion engines and lobbying against change?

[tim333]

I effectively voted for the Ultra Low Emission Zone although it will increase my taxes. At least I wrote go for it in the residents survey.

As the article suggests the cash cost of the electric busses may be zero with a longer deprecation period.

Against that "pollutants linked to one in 12 deaths in parts of London." Which would you choose? https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families...

[walshemj]

No but diesel owners who have for decades had a nice subsidy from my pocket have been :-(

[desas]

Probably have to offset that with the reduction of cost to the NHS of pollution related illnesses.

Outside of TfL and absent a "diesel scrappage scheme" the cost would be born by primarily by private individuals anyway.

[walshemj]

Seconded if you have ever been cycling behind a badly maintained diesel buss and had to stop because of the fumes half way up a hill you will empathise.

[cm2187]

Keeping in mind you probably won't hear them coming.

[detaro]

Manufacturers of electric vehicles already are rolling out noise generators for low speeds, and it's likely those will become mandatory.

[dingaling]

A friend's Renault Zoe EV has a 'whoosh' noise generator which thankfully can be disabled in the fusebox.

To me it would be more sensible to only trigger a noise generator upon feedback from the parking sensors, instead of polluting the environment with constant sci-fi noises.

[Reason077]

Noise generators for EVs are required, or soon to be required, in the EU and USA.

Acoustic Vehicle Alert System (AVAS): https://www.interregs.com/articles/spotlight/eu-updates-requ...

[solarkraft]

You do. I had the chance to ride on a BYD bus. The electric motors are not as quiet as I thought and the interior really likes to rattle.

Both things can be solved, but at the price hit of the EV tech I"m not sure the clients would be very willing to spend the money.

[albertgoeswoof]

Is there any research to back up your claim? What are the chances of getting cancer from this? Is there even a direct link? Is it better in aggregate to be an unfit bus rider or a fit cyclist?

[ditn]

There's actually the opposite evidence; it's worse to be in a vehicle than walk or cycle, and there's a few studies that say that the benefits of cycling outweigh the pollution exposure.

http://www.breathelondon.org/south-east/project/modes-transp...

[Reason077]

Most smart people driving in London are going to leave their car's climate control on the "recirculate" setting whenever possible. That gives you a more-or-less closed environment, running cabin air back through the car's filters rather than sucking in dirty air from the street.

But cyclists and pedestrians have no such luxury - they're breathing in the filth whenever they're on, or near, a busy road.

[kaybe]

If you only have a paper filter that won't help at all.

[Reason077]

By using the "recirculate" setting you avoid bringing in polluted air from outside the car in the first place, so it certainly does help. Just return to fresh air when away from busy roads and polluted areas.

And paper filters do, of course, remove dust and particulates, which are part of the problem. Just not things like NOx and volatile organics. And depending on the filter, it may not be effective against really small (eg PM2.5) particles.

[telchar]

Activated carbon filters are cheap, mine cost $12. I can't speak to whether all other cars have compatible fits though.

[tim333]

From a personal sample of one, I cycled 4 months on routes used by busses and developed a smokers cough - I've never smoked. I'd be surprised if that wasn't a lung cancer risk. I stopped after that. The worst fumes were from diesel busses though this was a few years back and they have probably fitted less polluting ones now.

[cup-of-tea]

The World Health Organisation declared diesel exhaust carcinogenic in 2012: https://www.iarc.fr/en/media-centre/pr/2012/pdfs/pr213_E.pdf

[Reason077]

I don't think it's healthy at all to ride on London buses, especially in a hot summer when the buses have all their windows open. The air seems really bad inside - you can smell it and feel it in your lungs.

[superqwert]

About half of pollutants come from brakes and tyres - http://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/bitstream/JR...

Bringing in electric buses will not decrease these pollutants. They will also not remove enough of the other half of the pollutants. The change needs to be far wider and harsher.

[_ea1k]

well, the regenerative braking will reduce brake dust a bit. Certainly not completely, but its a start.

[Reason077]

Anecdotally, regenerative braking on an EV reduces brake pad wear by somewhere around 50-80%. It's rare to have to replace brake pads in an EV, or even to see them significantly worn.

On urban buses, which are constantly starting and stopping, I imagine it could be even more.

[londons_explore]

If EV companies were confident in their engineering, one could design a system with entirely electric braking.

No brake pads required. Simply dump the energy into the battery (or a big heater for the excess when the battery is full or too cold to charge)

Obviously, you can't have a failure in the electrical or control system or you can't brake anymore, so that part will have to be designed with much more redundancy than it is in todays vehicles.

[superqwert]

how will they reduce braking dust? I thought they were primarily only going to use the brake power for energy.

[JumpCrisscross]

> how will they reduce braking dust?

"In urban environments, brake wear can contribute up to 55 % by mass to total non-exhaust traffic-related PM10 emissions" [1]. (The "abrasion processes which result in direct particulate matter (PM) emission are tyre, brake, clutch and road surface wear, with other potential sources being engine wear, abrasion of wheel bearings and corrosion of other vehicle components, street furniture and crash barriers.")

When a vehicle regeneratively brakes, the brakes aren't engaged. Instead, the transmission connects to a generator, which resists the vehicle's motion as it converts kinetic energy into electricity.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4315878/

[rjmunro]

Braking dust comes from brake pads rubbing against brake disks. Electric vehicles slow down by running the motor in reverse and recharging the battery, therefore don't use the brake pads and brake disks as much, especially at higher speeds where the brake dust problem is the worst.

[Tepix]

Using the engine for braking means the physical brake will not be used, so there will be no dust in that case.

[ivl]

Regenerative braking is using the electric motor as a generator for a time during braking. So you're not dealing with pads and rotors wearing down, at least not as much.

[adrianN]

You need your braking pads less when you convert the kinetic energy in electricity.

[superqwert]

Thanks for that, all

[rjmunro]

What do you mean "They will also not remove enough of the other half of the pollutants." Surely they will remove 100% of those, plus most of the brake dust.

It's true that there will be an increase in road / tyre dust due to the extra weight of batteries, but I'd be very surprised if this was as much as was saved elsewhere.

[cup-of-tea]

I think he's talking about all the other vehicles on the roads other than buses.

[bloak]

s/About half of pollutants/About half of PM10/