E.g. instead of car pool lanes, have fast lanes for low emission cars.

Or “health warnings” on adverts for high polluters.

This is iconic, for me, of why I don’t trust solutions that rely solely on market mechanisms – humans really don’t think rationally all the time, esp when Madison Avenue is pounding the populace with marketing that says SUVs make you sexy.

Best,

D

As you say, in the UK we’ve had prices at nearly $8 a gallon for years. In 2000 there were big protests against what were then considered high prices, with refineries picketed and pumps running dry. Blair’s government went for cowardice and cancelled a planned tax increase.

So for over 8 years we’ve had “high” prices (in fact it’s probably better to describe current prices as normal and previous prices as abnormally low).

Yet in those 8 years sales of SUVs continued to grow. The average CO2 emissions of new cars has failed to decline as much as the car-makers modest (and voluntary!) targets Miles driven p.a. continued to increase. People – when in showrooms choosing a new car – forgot the pain of petrol prices because nearly $8 a gallon became routine.

Now, of course, with petrol at $8.70 everyone’s complaining again. Most drivers will have changed their cars in the past 8 years so had an opportunity to aim for fuel efficiency, but they didn’t take it. The economy did well in those years, people felt richer, they spent more on cars.

It’s hard to determine whether it’s general economic woes or high gas prices specifically that will have the most impact. In a year or two the world economy will improve, and perhaps oil prices will be more stable at a new higher trading range. If so, my guess is you’ll see:

– the “miles driven p.a.” graph returning to its usual upwards slope
– improvement in SUV sales
– return to the usual increases in numbers of cars on the road
– no-one caring about public transit

High fuel prices aren’t enough. What’s needed is year-after-year of penal gas price rises, for perhaps a decade or more. My fear (and expectation) is that the current encouraging signs will evaporate the moment economic woes are behind us.

Right.

I thought the three I called out were on the right track, just pointing out the curve ahead. We don’t do everything at once, we need baby steps, then bigger steps. I think we’re getting toward galvanization, but vested interests are muddying the waters and we have a ton of sunk costs in autocentric infrastructure, so someone needs to effect change.

Best,

D

the miracle needed now is to get the money set to see that coal and oil are a true menace to the future. the general population has nothing to lose in changing and is basically waiting to find out what we’re going to do about all this.

Societies and groups don’t move unless galvanized, motivated, and organized.

PO may be one way to do that, but price signals do the galvanizing quite well, and the vested interests are doing quite well at maintaining the status quo.

My suspicion is that there is insufficient political will in this country to fund R&D for alternative energy sources/carriers so $9/gal gas & $3.5K heating bills will do the galvanizing and motivating (building insulation is a big chunk of a wedge). Insufficient political will, that is, until the people lead and the leaders follow.

Best,

D