• XIIIesq@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      The only cycling I do is my commute, it’s ten miles each way on hilly roads. I’m not 21 anymore and I absolutely wouldn’t be cycling it without an ebike. This saves 100 miles of driving every week.

      Yh, it’s worse than a regular bike but you shouldn’t let good be the enemy of perfect.

      • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        That’s like saying exercise is bad for the environment, shit take.

        They are more carbon intensive to produce, since they are a regular bike, with additional parts.

        • sopo@sopuli.xyz
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          7 months ago

          Actually mate, I know it sounds ridiculous, but it has been demonstrated that, statistically, because of the extra amount of calories burned and the pollution due to food production and transportation in modern times, ebikes are greener despite the higher impact of their production.

          Of course the specific case can be different, maybe someone already grows their own organic food and buys an ebike without doing any distance that they couldnt cover easily with their acoustic bike, and then proceeds after only a few months to throw their ebike off a bridge (stupid example, but much more important when studying the impact of electric cars vs ICE cars, if an EV gets into a really bad accident or fire in the first ~20-30k kms of its life, then it would have been slightly better for everyone that it wasnt built, compared to an ICE car)

          As far as exercise goes, it has also been shown that ebikes results on average in more exercise by more people, because people cover much bigger distances, and/ore use it more often, and because it allows you to smooth out the ride (making some roads, especially climbs, cyclable to people who wouldn’t have been able to do them with a normal bike), and to decide for yourself when you want to put more effort.

          • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            The person would still need to exercise by another method and still need to consume those calories…

            All it’s doing is pushing it to some other metric to make theirs look better.

            Sorry, it’s a shit take since people still need all of that exercise and food regardless the food still needs to be shipped, bike or ebike and supplemental exercise. You know what’s even better for the environment using this asinine logic, never leaving the house and having everything delivered, it’s someone else’s problem, just like using an ebike and claiming it’s better.

            • frezik@midwest.social
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              6 months ago

              That doesn’t add up the way you think it does. An e-bike is still exercise. In fact, it’s pretty good exercise because for general health, time spent doing physical work means more than the actual exertion level of that exercise. For body building, you do need high intensity, but not for general health.

              What it adds up to is that e-bike riders tend to get more exercise because the motor lets them go longer distances. What you end up with is transportation and exercise being done together, and the extra calories don’t need to be spent on separate exercise time.