EPA clamping down

The story I've been told is that the exhaust coming from a 2010 spec engine is actually cleaner than the air (ambient air, if you will) in the LA basin or in the Central Valley on a heavily polluted day. A lot of people don't understand that CA has implemented all these BS laws because in certain areas (LA Basin, Central Valley) they cannot meet the FEDERAL air quality standards. That failure is due to geography, weather patterns & population/vehicle density & we are all getting screwed as a consequence.

If the EPA does clamp down on tuners it will be like gun control and drug laws. It will just criminalize a lot of otherwise law-abiding citizens and create an undergound market in which the purveyors will enjoy outsized profits (which they will probably fail to pay proper taxes on, costing the govt. precious revenue)

So how hard is it to emigrate to Canada for a truck driver if I'm not from Pakistan?

 

I got my boat winterized and the boat tech told me that they are starting to put catalytic converters on boats now. I'm sure the diesel powered ones are going to have DPF's. They are getting crazy with all this stuff. Todays diesel engine produces almost 99% less emissions than a truck built before emissions. How much cleaner can they get them before they realize that there are much greater polluters out there that they aren't even looking at or considering to clean up?

 

Yah, I never thought of boats. I guess ocean and lake freighters will be next too. I like the idea of a clean environment, but I think the epa may be too aggressive with the spacing of the tiers. If the engines of today are so clean maybe the epa and carb could calm down a bit and loosen the strangle hold they have on everyone!

 

Making fuel is bad for the environment so whats the point on making an engine run cleaner if it uses more fuel which in turn probably has a higher effect on the environment then on that uses less fuel but pollutes more.

Canada does have strict emission policies, Ontario especially. I could see it happening soon, they'll have some type of road side inspection probably random, pulling over trucks and pickups checking to see if all the emission crap is in place and working.

 

That's exactly the issue. Forcing manufacturers to chase that last half percent of emissions dramatically drives up the cost of diesel engines while reducing their efficiency. Its not about the environment anymore, its about control.

 

I was told the drive clean in Ontario only checks opacity. That being the case I'm willing to bet my bully dog'd acert will do better than stock .

 

The emission testing in Ontario is required to maintain registration, and even then it's a joke. I know someone that went for the test, he failed miserably. The guy poured something in the tank, said leave the truck running and go for lunch. After lunch it passed. They can do this test on any truck in Ontario however.

The problem with Ontario is if they can tell you've changed emission equipment. There's no test for that, and anyone can be fined.

 

how about if you run biodiesel (vegetable oil diesel) to do the test and then go back to diesel?

 

half a percent? NOX from EPA04 Engines dropped 90% for EPA10 engines and PM dropped 80%. Thats a lot more than a half of a percent.

The new EPA10 engines are running much better, yes I hate EPA07 engines, but I also am optimistic and dont see any of this going away. Therefore I don't see a reason to fight it and whine like make, just try to come up with the best solution.

You can argue that the engines use more fuel so they produce more emissions all you want but the reality is that the emissions they are trying to control are not increased by the slight fuel usuage which as now dropped to very little if any for the EPA10 engines.

Basically lets say for every 1 gallon of fuel your truck burns it produces 100 units of PM and 100 units of NOX (for easy math reasons). Lets say your pre EPA04 truck is getting 7mpg. In 1000 miles your truck will use 143 gallons of fuel. That means your trucks emissions are 14,300 PM and 14,300 NOX.

Now you go out and buy an EPA10 truck. This truck lets say for some reason gets 6mpg. Through the use of various emissions reduction technologies it is able to scrub the emissions down to only 1 unit of PM and 1 unit of NOX. In 1,000 miles you will use 167 gallons of fuel. Thats nearly 17% more fuel than you were using. However lets look at the emissions numbers. Your EPA 2010 truck only produced 167 units of PM and 167 units of NOX. Thats nearly a 99% reduction in emissions.

Now many people always see 80 or 90% reduction figures and it doesn't register to many how big of a deal it is because the biggest the reduction number can ever be is 99.99999......... Flip the number around though and lets say we went back to your pre emissions truck from where we are at now with the EPA10 truck and emissions would increase by nearly 8,500%. Now it seems like they maybe are doing something.

The bottom of the line is that the emissions were reduced drastically and in order to match the emissions of a pre emissions engine simply by burning more fuel would take a truck that would not be practical.


You can argue the logistics of producing that extra gallon yes. Most of the off road equipment all has this equipment anyways. Thats not my point though. I don't get into the ethics of the discussion of why we even have them in the first place or the overall foot print of making that extra gallon, I just state the truck to truck facts which show that burning that extra gallon creates nowhere near the pollution levels of a pre emissions engine at the truck.