Decarbonizing Transportation in the U.S.
A great deal is implied by the meme here, principally why many other nations, some more advanced than others, have modernized mass transportation systems that cause gross reductions in car VMT (vehicle miles traveled). Quite conspicuously, the U.S. has failed to make even the most tentative first steps here.
There are those who point to our unique population distribution (but is it unique, or even rare?), or our strong property rights. But here’s a theory: there is huge profit to be made selling cars and the gasoline that fuels them.
Guess who was chosen to deliver the keynote address at the Biofuels and Low-Carbon Fuel Standard Summit that I attended last year near San Francisco? The American Petroleum Institute. It was both astounding and amusing, if you happen to have a sick sense of humor. To those of us siting agape in the audience, it was like Cruella DeVille kicking off a PETA conference.
Kidding aside, it was a bold statement as to who wears the pants around here, made even more clear when, in the course of the proceedings, another spokesperson from the API said, and I swear this is true, “Electric vehicles are nice, but we need to get our kids to and from their soccer games.” Is there some bizarre principle of biology that renders young soccer players and EVs mutually incompatible?
America: Either we get used to Big Oil’s leading us around by the nose, or we acknowledge that we have some hard work in front of us if we are to make effective strives in decarbonizing our transportation sector.
Of course, this discussion applies to the here and now. Here’s a photo I just came across that speaks to the destruction of the Los Angeles public transportation system in the 1930s at the hands of GM, Standard Oil, Phillips Petroleum, and Firestone. The purpose: sell tires, cars, and gasoline. The victims: everyone but the shareholders in those four concerns.
In truth, not much has changed here. We have subsidies for the oil companies, a 90-year-old industry that is the wealthiest in the history of humankind. We have huge tax breaks that loot the U.S. Treasury to benefit almost exclusively corporations and the richest 0.1%. We have environmental collapse occurring at a rate never seen before, and an EPA that is aggressively demolishing the progress we’ve made in this arena over the last half century.
Turning this around will take hard work on everyone’s part, but winning the battle will be something your great-grand-children will applaud you for.
Craig,
“In truth, not much has changed here”.
I agree, your article provides a perfect insight into why the general public has grown weary of endless repetitions of old myths and conspiracy theories, endlessly repeated against an invented enemy.
Why attend such gatherings as the Biofuels and Low-Carbon Fuel Standard Summit if you are not prepared to listen to all the dynamics involved in achieving a low(er) carbon future ?
Technology is not a football game where if you cheer hard enough for your team, it will ‘win’!
The Oil Industry is absolutely essential to the world economy, and even more so to the prosperity of the US.
Old scandals and conspiracy theories surrounding the demise and unpopularity of tramways, trolleybuses and railway systems, is seldom repeated accurately as a result the myth has now grown larger than the reality.
Unlike you, for many years I’ve invested substantial financial and time resources to promoting the development and adoption of Electric vehicles, yet I don’t find it necessary to believe oil companies are “evil” or “enemies”, or involved in a huge conspiracy.
(incidentally, Exxon invented the modern Lithium battery).
Nor do oil companies receive any significant “subsidies” or taxpayer benefits. That’s another myth, endlessly repeated no matter how many times disproved.
What is not a myth, is Oil companies employ directly more than 10 million US citizens, and indirectly 10 times that number ! The oil industry is 28% of the US economy. The Oil industry is the largest and most valuable US taxpayer, and pays the highest ratio of tax.
Craig, apart from an ill-informed tired old rant against oil companies and sneering at a remark by a spokesman, (a bit hypocritical when you still don’t own an EV yourself), what do you hope to achieve with such nonsense ?
Your vague castigating of the US transport system offers no practical suggestions or solutions. In fact, it seems to be inspired by a desire to covertly support the principles contained in the equally ill-conceived, vague and quickly denied, “Green New Deal”.
Graig, as long as you keep trying to use environmental considerations as a cover to promote leftist politics, you will continue to alienate and weary the majority of the populace.
I wouldn’t care, but this sort of politically motivated distraction, makes it so much harder for the rest of us who are striving to enlist the general public’s support for adopting new clean(er) technology.
Forget all the negatives, look at the positive achievements emerging.