I understand that it's going to be very difficult, and it's going to take years, but that's no reason to not do it.
Gasoline dispensing is extremely complicated - what you really mean is that the complexity is just hidden from you and has been optimized on for decades.
Next time you fill your car with ~15 gallons (60L), have a think about how many gallons of diesel must have been burnt to get that gas you're pumping. Have a think about all the machinery involved in making it, transporting it and then you pumping it. Trucks, oil tankers, more trucks, pumps, etc.
Have a think about how differently we would think if we had to physically carry our own 15 gallons of carcinogenic explosive liquid every time we wanted to enable us to drive ~350 (550km) miles.
The system we have works very well, but it's terrible in every way.
I have put quite a lot of thought into that in fact
It's a bit of a labor of love to be quite honest. I call it Project Regression,and I've been spending many of my adult years filling out my understandings of the technologies and infrastructures that make modern life possible, why they were developed, why in the order they were, and what would need to be retained and elucidated to a human being to allow that development to be able to bootstrap from nothing within a lifetime.
And yes, I get annoyed every time someone ends up trying to pull a piece of that structure out without making clear they've thought through all the consequences. Something I'm not confident many do, but I've spent my life doing, because I've not run into anyone else who could be bothered to.
My very existence as a thinking, contributing member of society is predicated on the smooth operation of modern infrastructure, so I do get rather aggressive when people start advocating for sweeping change without showing that they've done all the work. Unrealistic expectations on the rate of infrastructure upgrades and propogation gets us nowhere.
I've not even got a financial stake in any company in particular's outcome; and I've been sitting through saga after saga of waste, moral grandstanding, outright lies, negligent corporate behavior, and a complete bloody breakdown in any semblance of sanity in the world as I recognize it.
I wish I had your optimism; or was still naive enough to be able to stoke the fires of my own. This bloody year has just bloody obliterated it though.
Ya know. I'm sorry. Forget I said anything. I'm in a bit of a bad headspace at the moment; and I just don't seem like I can keep things coherent enough to meaningfully contribute anymore right now. Ended up rewriting this about 5 times, and still not able to articulate anything I'm really satisfied with.
I know exactly how you feel, and I think I've just 'given up' and gone the other way. I try to accept that our lives will have to get less convenient, and the economy will have to take a bit of a hit as we move to things that are better for us, and better for the planet.
So we'll take a couple of steps backwards in order to take many forwards, and I'm OK with that.
I've also spent a lot of time in Latin America and Africa, and I hope that they can just go straight to the 'right' solutions because they are not so entrenched as we are with what we already have.
Who knows though, right. Certainly nothing is perfect.
I hope you have a good day, I'd buy you a coffee/beer if I could.
Gasoline dispensing is extremely complicated - what you really mean is that the complexity is just hidden from you and has been optimized on for decades.
Next time you fill your car with ~15 gallons (60L), have a think about how many gallons of diesel must have been burnt to get that gas you're pumping. Have a think about all the machinery involved in making it, transporting it and then you pumping it. Trucks, oil tankers, more trucks, pumps, etc.
Have a think about how differently we would think if we had to physically carry our own 15 gallons of carcinogenic explosive liquid every time we wanted to enable us to drive ~350 (550km) miles.
The system we have works very well, but it's terrible in every way.