This is a figure from the Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas. Predicting the future is difficult, but it highlights an important point. Even if we don’t reduce our consumption voluntarily, oil is a limited resource that will expire at some point. This point is called “peak oil”, and has already occurred in the US. We won’t really know for sure when this will happen until we’ve passed this point.

The scarcity of oil will cause its value to rise, further burdening consumers. If, however, we make significant investment in alternatives, we can avoid the high costs of oil use. In either case, it’s likely that the way our system works will change dramatically. Perhaps electric cars will replace petroleum cars, but such new technology would be expensive and only economically feasible for part of the population. At the same time, the price of using old, petroleum cars would increase.

Ideally, such a shift would highlight our reliance on the automobile in a way that encourages change. Personal transportation has revolutionized our way of life, and we probably won’t see it disappear. However, if we could change how we live such that cars aren’t essential for many, the difficulty of changing our system would be decreased. This can be done through a variety of ways, some of which I have explored. I don’t think that such a change would be harmful to our society, in fact, it would probably benefit it in many ways.

It’s easy to get bogged down by science that shows the repercussions of our addiction to oil. Clearly, the statistics are concerning. However, we should look at such problems as a challenge. When considering our history and work being done by others on this problem, it’s impossible to not have hope.

image: wikimedia

I’ve mentioned hybrids and electric cars several times, but haven’t yet posted about biofuels. Biofuels – like ethanol and biodiesel, seem like a great idea on the surface. They’re grown locally, and absorb greenhouse gasses (GHG) induced by their burning. They will certainly be an important part of any attempt to reduce oil demand, because of their potential and federal regulation requiring their production. However, the extent to which they can offset oil use sustainably is debatable.

Many worry that using crops like corn will increase food costs and divert land from food production to fuel production. Ethanol production as a whole actually creates greenhouse gasses. Advanced ethanol plants are only required to reduce GHG emissions by 20% when compared to gasoline. Increased demand for crops could cause forests to be cleared, further adding to their environmental impact.

Some concerns, like rising food costs, are exaggerated. Corn prices have gone up due to ethanol, but corn is a small part of how annual food costs are estimated. The cost of energy has had a more significant effect on food prices than ethanol, and ethanol could even be saving consumers money by reducing fuel bills.

Even so, the current biofuel king, ethanol, has limited potential. It is not feasible to fuel the nation’s fleet with ethanol, both because most cars cannot run it in pure form, and it would not be possible to divert such a large amount of cropland. It does have value in supplementing and reducing demand for fuel, but it’s not an end-all.

New technology in biofuel production could hold great promise. Cellulosic ethanol is created from non-edible structure parts of plants, and can be made from crops grown on marginal land. Algae is also being experimented with to create biodiesel. Such technologies could do much more than corn-based ethanol to reduce oil demand, but we have not yet found ways to economically mass-produce them.

I think biofuels will play an important role in transitioning from petroleum. They can be used as supplements in existing fuels and distribution. They offer range that batteries cannot supply (in that you can simply refuel). If biofuels can overcome barriers of cropland use and GHG emissions, they will likely be a big part of future transportation. I don’t think I could see them being the primary fuel given the push for electric and hybrid cars, but biofuels shouldn’t be underestimated.

image: xkcd.com

Top Gear is a British television show in which the commentators try out new cars, run cars through challenges and interview various celebrities, all with a quirky sense of humor. They’ve done some pretty crazy things, including driven to the north pole, traveling through the rainforest with cars bought sight-unseen on the internet, and using a Ford Focus as a beach assault craft. One of my favorite segments, however, is a simple car review for an Aston Martin V12 Vantage. It’s almost a 5-minute clip, and the cinematography is a amazing. However, only 3 or 4 lines are spoken. One line Jeremy Clarkson (the reviewer) says is

“I just can’t help thinking that thanks to all sorts of things; the environment, the economy, problems in the middle east, the relentless war on speed … cars like this will soon be consigned to the history books.”

He’s probably right, too. I don’t think performance cars are going away, but there will be a change in how they are made. The V12 engine that the Aston being reviewed has is one example of something that will probably fade into history. A V12 engine has 12 cylinders as opposed to the typical 4 that most standard cars have (it’s bigger, basically). This can make the engine smoother and more powerful, but creates much more friction and diminishes fuel economy. The Aston only gets about 17 MPG, which isn’t great for such a small car.

People that are going to be buying such a car are probably not as concerned about the price of gas. Looking at the bigger picture, however, one might wonder if all cars in the future will be echos of cars built today in terms of performance. I don’t think so.

Cars built today are more powerful than ever before, but have fuel economy that would be unheard-of decades ago. Electric motors are actually better than gasoline motors because they have better torque, better efficiency and don’t require a gearbox (the problem is building a battery that will support them). Even Porsche has announced a hybrid, and Tesla Motors has a high-performance supercar that is completely electric.

Why even bother creating a racing hybrid? Isn’t that wasteful when we could instead be churning out Priuses? Maybe. However, I think it’s human nature to push things to the limit and see how far, how quick or how good something can be. If the industry can show that efficiency and performance are not necessarily mutually exclusive, maybe hybrids won’t get such a bad rap.

One mode of transportation often overlooked as an alternative to cars is the bicycle. To those that can afford to drive a car, a bicycle seems like a slower, less comfortable, and less accepted way to get around. However, a bicycle is much cheaper to run, it can give users the benefit of a workout, and it has virtually no emissions. Also, bicycle commuters reduce the amount of cars on the road.

I was looking for a figure on how much Minnesota spend on bicycle infrastructure, but I instead came upon a site that lamented about wasteful spending in Minnesota’s transportation system. Funding for building bicycle trails was labeled as “diverting” from the “core transportation infrastructure”.

Obviously, the bike has limited potential as a transportation mode, so maintaining roads is important. However, statements like this that dismiss bicycle transportation are short-sighted. Part of the problem with commuting by bicycle is that infrastructure is lacking, further diminishing the potential of the bike as a commuting tool.

Even so, bicycle commuting is on the rise. I recently biked on the Midtown Greenway, which is a great trail that runs throughout the city and into suburbs. I saw a fair amount of recreation bikers, but I also saw people riding in suits, and three burleys (child trailers) that were filled with groceries instead of kids. Bicycle commuters seem to be on the rise, albeit modestly.

The Midtown Greenway

Image: Wikipedia

Replacing a car completely with a bike would be very challenging. Severe weather, heavy loads, long distances and dangerous routes are a few barriers to such a switch. However, as a supplement to car commuting, I think biking should be much more serious consideration.

It’s been a bad week for offshore drilling. The mantra of “drill, baby, drill” has been changed to “spill, baby, spill” by several commentators. The Deepwater Horizon well is now leaking 5000 barrels (210,000 gallons) a day.With a solution still potentially weeks away, it is likely that this will eclipse the Exxon Valdez spill in both volume and environmental impact.

The oil spill from space, April 25

Image credit: NASA

Many are now second-guessing proposed offshore drilling by the administration, and there will likely be much more debate on the issue. This incident is clearly a tragedy, but is the solution to this accident a reduction in offshore drilling? It would be great if we could, but we cannot simply stop offshore drilling without addressing the real problem.

We are completely dependent on oil. Offshore drilling is one temporary solution to this problem. It is incredible to see the resources we put into finding oil for drilling. The rigs themselves are small cities, specialized boats can map oil the seafloor, the drills are incredibly complex, and billions are invested in finding oil every year. Even so, we could stop new offshore drilling pretty easily, but all that accomplishes is moving where the drilling is taking place. If we’re still willing to pay exorbitant prices for oil, companies will go to incredible lengths to find it.

If we really want to stop offshore drilling, we need to address our addiction to oil. We need to make real efforts to reduce our demand, and shift our investment from drilling to conservation and alternatives. Some say that we need an effort similar to the effort we put into sending a man to the moon in developing a sustainable energy system. Actually, it will probably be harder than that because of the scale of such an undertaking. However, I think that such an undertaking would commend the same world respect and national inspiration as the Apollo program.

Efforts to reduce the use of fossil fuels in transportation are often moved by concern for the climate. This weekend, the not-so-shocking news about climate was that the Kerry-Lieberman-Graham climate bill’s unveiling was delayed. Graham (R-SC) was concerned that immigration would be focused on before climate, so he pulled out. As the only Republican of the three, his presence at the unveiling was crucial, so it was pushed back. The bill would be part of a larger effort to pass some sort of climate legislation this year (a similar bill passed the house last year).

There’s plenty of speculation on what will happen next. Some don’t think a bill will pass this year. Some think the bill is too weak, others think it is too strong. The bigger picture, though, is that this could be the first comprehensive climate legislation enacted in the US. It will certainly be interesting to see how this plays out, as this would be a major shift in national policy.

Earlier this week, I read that home sales in suburbs and “exurban” houses had radically dropped, and many simply would not sell. At the same time, growth in “core” counties is increasing. This trend was linked to the onset of $4 gas in 2008, which made commute costs soar (census estimates for those years recently became available).

The fact that a rise in the cost of using a car can influence a home’s value so drastically highlights the role that the automobile has played in development. In the past 50 years, the way developments are planned has completely changed. For better or worse, houses can be much farther from stores or community buildings, shifting the majority of transportation investment into roadways. Under this system, mass transit can be much more difficult to run, and the total volume of transit needed increases.

Though increased transportation is needed, there are benefits to the freedom that cars allow. For example, enclosed malls were first built in the 50’s and allowed shoppers much more convenience and choices. Malls could be built outside the city on relatively cheap land, easily accessible by automobile. Large, big-box stores could also be built under this model. Today, as we try to find ways to reduce our car use, this ingrained system makes change difficult.

The Mall of America

Image credit: Wikipedia

I grew up in a house from a development made in the early 90’s. It had a big yard, good road system, and pretty poor pedestrian access. The most convenient way to get groceries was to go to the Rainbow down the freeway. Even further down the freeway, a large shopping development was created with pretty much any store or entertainment shoppers would want. This was a great neighborhood… if you had a car. Without one, it would be very difficult to get anywhere.

In 6^th grade, we moved to a house from a development created in the late 50′s. Car ownership in the 50’s was on the rise, but the neighborhood wasn’t completely centered on it. Developments circle around the town, which has grocery stores and a variety of other small merchants. There even used to be a streetcar that connected the town to the city. Not only did we gain the community that comes with a centralized town, but also we no longer needed to travel as far to do errands. This was a complete change from our old neighborhood made in the 90′s.

When thinking about transportation, it’s important to acknowledge that there are two sides to the problem. First, we can look into making more efficient, smart transportation. What’s even easier, and probably cheaper to do is look at how we can reduce transit (especially automobile) needed in the first place.

The US Green Building Council maintains a standard for energy efficient, “green” buildings called LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental and Design. This rigorous standard can be earned by efficient buildings and is a highly prestigious certification if earned. Recently they have come out with a standard for neighborhoods as well. Looking over a summary of the standard, it’s interesting to see that what they are proposing not only reduces energy and automobile use, but creates a better community as well. Things like neighborhood schools, walkable streets, historic preservation and open communities are listed in the standard. These are things that most towns would like to have anyways, and they have the added benefit of helping with transit and efficiency.

Perhaps too much focus is placed on creating more efficient cars or technologies when there are much simpler ways we can reduce demand. Undoubtedly, we have progressed to a point where cars will be needed on some level. Still, why not strive to make neighborhoods more community-centered and efficient at the same time? This could be a win-win.

Today, I came across a troubling article. For the first time in 10 years of asking the question, Gallup found that Americans are prioritizing the development of energy resources over protection for the environment. To me, this statistic isn’t much of a shock, but it is saddening. Has our dependence pushed us this far? Do we only appreciate the environment as a means to an end? Most importantly, I think: what are we leaving for future generations – do we care?

Now, I should note that the American lifestyle does require a significant amount of energy. Today, we import most of our oil – Canada being the leading supplier. However, the mining of tar sands in Canada for oil has drastic environmental consequences. Too often, we like the outputs of a production, but we don’t want it happening in our backyards. In this sense, it’s only fair that if we want the energy, we should sacrifice our own environment to get it (not that the two are necessarily mutually exclusive).

The recession, too, obviously plays a big part in American’s answers. The environment easily gets pushed aside when issues closer to home emerge. It’s much easier to be distressed over a pay cut, or even a job loss instead of a drilling station across the country. Is such shortsighted thinking really fair to us, though?

I think my biggest problem with this prioritization, however, is that it seems we think the environment is there for us (in the present sense) to do with as we please. We have the technology to develop the world’s resources to much greater levels, but should we? Whether we like it or not, the environment is a cycle. We seem fixated with the idea of harvesting all we can, but in doing this we convert the cycle into a linear system – and linear systems end.

How, then, should we fix our dependencies? I think we need to realize that what we do to the earth now will be our legacy to future generations. If we, like the child in The Giving Tree, only take from the environment, the only thing our children may inherit will be a stump.  We should put much more emphasis in finding systems that will not only meet our needs today, but will benefit us tomorrow as well. This won’t be easy to do – but great achievements seldom are.

Image credit: NASA

Last week, I had the chance to visit DC with my family. It was a great experience to see, among other things, their great transit system.

The DC Metro at the Airport

Obviously, riding their Metro (specifically; the subway system) wasn’t the highlight of the trip, but I was impressed by how well it worked. We were able to get everywhere quickly by using the Metro or walking for the 4 days we were there. It wasn’t inconvenient either – we drove to DC, so we had a car, but it was parked the whole time. Using it to get around would definitely be slower and more expensive. Plus, riding the Metro was more efficient.

a

Right?

a

Actually, I was surprised to see on Wikipedia that some forms of mass transit are less efficient than driving a normal car. Furthermore, vanpools and hybrids were listed as more efficient than any other form of mass transit.

a

What?

a

Perhaps Wikipedia was incorrect. However, the numbers cited were from a study by the US Department of Energy. Even so, I did a little more research and found that others had similar findings. Buses were listed as 20% less efficient than cars, and rail modes of transit were only 40% more efficient in terms of BTUs (energy).

Note: Based on EIA data. Car efficiency based on 1.57 passengers (average) I created the 3 passenger “carpool” figure using data from below.

Source: EIA, TRANSPORTATION ENERGY DATA BOOK: EDITION 28–2009

What does this mean?

First of all, note that riding transit is better then driving your car simply because it’s running anyways. If you drive a car, you’re creating an additional source of emissions. Driving your car with no passengers is still less efficient than riding a bus (figures based on the average of 1.57 pass/car). However, if you just compare energy, the average car is more efficient than a bus. This may be surprising to many. After all, a full bus is more efficient than most cars in terms of passenger miles per gallon (buses get around 4 MPG, but if you have 25 people 25*4 = 100 passenger miles per gallon).

The problem, however, is that buses aren’t full all the time. Even if they take a full load into a city, they probably won’t have one coming out. Also, they run throughout the day, and during off-peak hours they won’t have as many passengers. This lack of load pushes down the efficiency of buses. If people could commit to routes, transit could probably become much more efficient. However, to compete with the freedom of an automobile and adhere to the realities of our society, they need to have these routes.

That’s not the whole picture though. Buses may increase the efficiency of automobiles by relieving traffic. They provide a social good by offering transportation to those who cannot afford to own a car. Furthermore, mass transit users are generally in the minority compared to car users. Perhaps if more used mass transit, it would become more efficient through infrastructure and route optimizations.

As I said before, rail solutions such as subways and light rail are actually about 40% more efficient than cars. This may seem low given the infrastructure invested in such systems. However, the energy used by cars is provided by gasoline while rail systems can use electricity directly. Therefore, they can greatly reduce oil consumption. Furthermore, you could power those systems with renewable energy. However, today 50% of our electricity comes from coal, so there’s a way to go before renewable sources take over (currently less than 10%). Rail systems have benefits in speed and throughput that other forms of transportation do not have, however.

A caveat: I am by no means an expert on mass transit. However, I was surprised that it wasn’t significantly more efficient than automobiles, which I had assumed before. What I take away from this is that there is no “silver bullet” to our transportation problems. A well-run transit system does have benefits, but it isn’t an end-all. When combined with carpools, city planning, pedestrian routes and other ideas, however, a solution seems closer to reality.

FDR Memorial

I recently came across this video;

Link: Is Earth Past the Tipping Point?

This video was made my the University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment and is based on an article recently published in Nature. In this article, scientists proposed global capacities – boundaries – for things such as climate change, freshwater use, ocean acidification, biodiversity loss, and more. I was interested by the way they presented this though, because it shows the need for a fundamental change in mindset. We’ve developed rapidly in the past decades, and today the consequences of our lifestyle are becoming increasingly more obvious. There is already a visible change in the transportation sector as we push for more sustainable technology. I think that this push will become increasingly more apparent to the point of becoming a primary goal for future technology. It’s likely that this will be the greatest challenge our generation faces, simply because the stakes are so high.