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Saturday, September 14, 2013

Lead in Gas: 4 Grams/Gallon????

Leaded gas typically had 4 grams of lead per gallon??????

This seems unbelievable to me.

4 comments:

  1. Well, yes. Trace amounts of materials pretty much only matter in catalysis and biological processes (but I repeat myself.)

    Leaded gasoline was known to be dangerous right from the start. It was a crazy thing to do.

    Also, lead is heavy, so 4 grams of lead is the equivalent molar amount as 0.25 grams of gasoline.

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  2. Also:
    http://globalleadnet.com/131/the-secret-history-of-lead-a-special-report
    for a history of just how crooked the whole concept of leaded gas actually was. It turns out one reason cars last longer now is that ... they don't use lead!

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  3. Jim Bales8:06 AM

    WS,

    Does that strike you as too high or too low?

    (FWIW, a gallon of gasoline weighs ~ 6 kg, so 4 grams is just 0.000 67, or 1/1500. Wikipedia says that the fraction of tetraethyl lead in gasoline was about 1 part in 1,500, which matches.)

    Best
    Jim

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  4. 4 grams is the weight of 4 dimes(American currency) so that's not really a lot.

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