Happy New Year 2024!

I wish you all a happy and healthy 2024! Read more about my plans for Abgase.org for the new year.

The year 2023 is behind us, the good resolutions have been made and the champagne bottle is empty. Maybe you also watched some fireworks, and, as someone who adores pointless air pollution, admired the thick, toxic billows of smoke which contaminated the air of towns and villages for a long time after. Germany, for instance, tends to churn out 1,700 metric tons of particulate matter from fireworks on a regular New Year's Eve, which is an amount that road traffic usually needs almost twenty days to pile up, meaning that in most places, the air quality is never as poor throughout the entire year as it is at the very beginning of it (all links in German). Talk about starting the year off appropriately – we certainly do so in terms of pollution.

Last year, I resolved to finally reactivate my "exhaust gas homepage". I would consider it a partial success. Thanks to the new software, I can publish quickly and easily, without risking that the technical effort could wear out my time and motivation. I managed to set up, configure, and play around with the new site this year. Writing content was a bit more difficult. Except for an introduction and a biographical piece about my love for exhaust fumes, I only wrote two blog articles so far.

I fully intend to increase this output considerably in 2024. Since the basic foundation is done now, I only need the right ideas, mood, and time. That should be doable! By writing more frequently, and about current topics, I will also try to make the site more visible again. Regular updates with content on up-to-date issues should make it much more interesting to revisit the site frequently. For instance, I'm planning on the following types of content for the blog:

• Reports and commentary on current, relevant topics in world events. Anything that is socially, ecologically, economically, politically, or culturally relevant to the topics of pollution and nature protection, climate change and environmental destruction, internal combustion engines and greenhouse gases. Because me and most visitors to this site are interested in these topics from a rather peculiar perspective, reactions and opinions will often be a bit unusual or contrary compared to more conventional reporting. After all, I can't deny that it makes me very happy on some level when new measures to reduce the exhaust emissions of two-stroke engines fail to pass, environmental objections to motorsports events are dismissed, or the phase-out of fossil fuels keeps getting delayed further and further. Anyone who loves the blue clouds and pungent smell of two-stroke exhaust fumes also has to wish that these sensual pleasures will remain present in everyday life as widely and for as long as possible. And as saddening as the deforestation of the rainforest is, it's also very thrilling, moving, and appealing to watch majestic, centuries-old trees succumb within seconds to howling chainsaws. Here, the bad news from elsewhere are often the good news, and the optimistic reports by others are what dampens our mood.
• Discoveries from websites and shops. Even today, you can still find astonishing examples for humanity's creativity in applying petrol engines to activities of sheer fun and joy – and how unconcerned or dismissive they are about the pollution they cause in the process. I've already prepared a few links. Look forward to a small museum of stunning examples of how humans will always find a way to bring a gas engine into the mix, absolutely anywhere and anytime. Sometimes, you could even just click a purchase link right then and there, and join in on the fun.
• Notices on upcoming TV programmes, movies, podcasts, video games, or events. From time to time, the worlds of popular media and culture come up with stuff that holds a particular charm for the exhaust fume enthusiast. However, since that usually wasn't the intention of the creators, those things can be rather difficult to find. With posts in this category, I'll try to help you not miss out on as much stuff in the future – and I'll always be glad for your own tips! Concrete examples from the past: an upcoming television report on encouraging young talent to take up gas-powered motorsports; a story in a news programme where, incidentally and without calling any particular attention to it, some massive air pollution is taking place; a video game which offers unusually realistic two-stroke engine noise and exhaust fume simulation; or a theatrical play featuring a real two-stroke motorcycle which fills the theatre hall with exhaust gas during the performance.
• Guides and tips for beginning, or future, recreational exhaust fume producers. From many e-mails I've received, I know that there are a lot of young people into exhaust fumes, who find their way onto this website and don't know if and how they could ever start acting out this passion themselves. From personal experience, I also know that this can be a huge challenge if you still live with your parents, have little money of your own, are growing up in the city, and maybe even, as was the case for me, don't have much of a clue about motors. I want to help as many of those boys and girls as I can to not end up unnecessarily dismissing and suppressing their passion for years and years, the way I did. Life is too short, and it would be a shame to miss out on such great joy! I want to allow everybody, no matter where they're at, to figure out concrete next steps they could be taking towards that goal, and find the confidence to follow them. How does an internal combustion engine even work, where can I find one cheaply so I can gain first experiences, what do I pour in the tank, how do I start it up and maintain it? More importantly, questions which many of my visitors will be particularly interested in, but are unlikely to find answers to elsewhere on the web: which engine types emit the thickest exhaust fumes with the most stinging smell? What influences the density, colour and odour of the exhaust gases, and how can I influence and optimise them? Which exhaust pipes allow me to easily aim with the fumes, and which amusing pranks and experiments can I try to play with the exhaust fumes? Always, of course, guided by two unconditional principles: how to do all of that while still observing any applicable laws, and always strictly considering health and safety when playing with petrol engines. Exhaust fumes are supposed to bring us joy and pleasure, not harm and health hazards.

There are a few other sections I'd like to work on this year. In order of priority:

• First entries to a "mind map" of all aspects of my fondnesses, and how they're interconnected. This used to be the core of my old exhaust gas websites, and with it, I tried to explain, in particular also to "outsiders", what's so fascinating about these topics to me and my like-minded friends. I hope to support this with many photos and videos for visualisation.
• A first prototype of the video database, in which I'd like to list interesting, publicly accessible videos from around the web, categorising and tagging them for easy searching by content. Are you looking for a video in which a young man in motocross gear is revving his four-stroke KTM enduro bike, holding his hand in front of the tailpipe, while the leaves of the bushes behind him are rustling from the bursts of exhaust shooting through them? Just set the appropriate filters, and click!
• First uploads to the new gallery, which is only accessible to friends, but hopefully will give a good glimpse into my collection of photos and videos which I've been amassing for over 25 years. I'm almost sure that by now, I have the world's largest repository of pictures and footage documenting how us humans have thoughtlessly and recklessly contaminated the nature we depend on, for sheer fun, sport, and leisure!

See you a year from now, for a retrospective on how many of these plans I ended up realising!