Tire Dust Makes Up the Majority of Ocean Microplastics, Study Finds
Tire Dust Makes Up the Majority of Ocean Microplastics, Study Finds
Recent studies have shown tire emissions to be a larger threat to global health than anyone realized—and EVs could make the problem worse.
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It's interesting to me that as soon as EV's are finally seriously becoming a thing, we are told that tire dust, rather than ICE emissions, are really the worst thing possible for the planet (and it's somehow implied that ICE vehicles don't have tires). When somebody points out that ICE vehicles do, in fact, have tires too, EV's are STILL worse because EV's are heavier than the equivalent ICE cars. Strangely, the fact that for years, people have been driving ludicrously overweight vehicles (the Ford F150, weighing in at 4,070 to 5,757 lbs, is the top selling passenger vehicle in the US, and last I checked, it had tires) was never an issue.
It's almost like people are incapable of comprehending that all types of pollution are important, not just one or the other. Exhaust emissions are bad. Tyre pollution is also bad. Reducing one is a good step. Reducing both would be even better.
Many things can be bad at once, and I’m sure tire particles really are bad. It is just weird that in the 137 years ICE cars have been manufactured (again, with tires the whole time), the fact that the tire particles were way worse than all the other things cars spew out went completely unnoticed.
I’m only being partially facetious. Yes I understand cars are now much cleaner than they used to be, so probably in the past tailpipe emissions were the dominant problem. But an awful lot of the articles talking about this are pushing the idea that EVs are WORSE for the environment than ICE cars (so let’s just keep driving our F150s!), which is absolutely untrue. Better is still better, even if it isn’t perfect.
We should push for hovercars
This why so many have always said that EVs are not the solution for climate change, they are and always will be a solution for the auto industry.
This is not the reason why they were saying this. They were saying it for other reasons. They didn't know before anyone else. They merely have one more reason now.
And yet it's the auto industry lobby who's trotting this line out because they're not really ready for EVs and this is a good delaying tactic for them.
It's not, because the same people who said evs are not the solution also say that the solution is accessible public transportation and bikes.
This (microplastics from wheels) is a well known fact in science for quite some time though.