Parking Infrastructure and the Environment

Mikhail Chester, Arpad Horvath, and Samer Madanat

We know surprisingly little about how parking infrastructure affects energy demand, the environment, and the social cost of vehicle travel. Passenger and freight movements are often the focus of energy and environmental assessments, but vehicles spend most of their lives parked. Because abundant free parking encourages solo driving and thus discourages walking, biking, and the use of public transit, it greatly contributes to urban congestion. The environmental impacts of parking and the driving it promotes are often borne by local populations and not the trip-takers themselves.

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2022-10-11T19:33:52+00:00Categories: ACCESS 39, Fall 2011|Tags: , |

Cash for Clunkers? The Environmental Impact of Mexico’s Demand for Used Vehicles

Lucas W. Davis and Matthew E. Khan

Over the last two decades private vehicle ownership in the developing world has increased at an unprecedented pace. Between 1990 and 2005 the total number of registered vehicles in developing countries rose from 110 million to 210 million, and by some estimates it is forecast to reach 1.2 billion by 2030. Rising incomes explain a large share of this growth; as people get richer, they can afford the personal mobility that an automobile confers. Some of this demand for automobiles is satisfied when people in poor countries buy new vehicles. But another important, yet rarely discussed, factor is international trade in used vehicles. High-income countries export large numbers of used vehicles to low-income countries, and this trade will probably grow.

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The Impact of Carsharing on Household Vehicle Ownership

Elliot Martin and Susan Shaheen

Carsharing in North America is changing the transportation landscape of metropolitan regions across the continent. Carsharing systems give members access to an automobile for short-term use. The shared cars are distributed across a network of locations within a metropolitan area. Members can access the vehicles at any time with a reservation and are charged by time or by mile. Carsharing thus provides some of the benefits of personal automobility without the costs of owning a private vehicle.

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2018-02-14T23:52:40+00:00Categories: ACCESS 38, Spring 2011|Tags: , |

Electric Two-Wheelers in China: Promise, Progress and Potential

Christopher Cherry

Electric two-wheelers have transformed the way people move in most Chinese cities. In just ten years, growth in electric two-wheelers—a category that includes vehicles ranging from electric bicycles to electric motorcycles—has substantially increased the total number of vehicles in China. Electric bike sales began modestly in the 1990s and started to take off in 2004, when 40,000 were sold. Since then, over 100 million have been sold and now more than 20 million are sold each year. Electric two wheelers, in short, represent the first mass-produced and mass-adopted alternative-fuel vehicles in the history of motorization.

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Life-Cycle Environmental Assessment of California High Speed Rail

Mikhail Chester and Arpad Horvath

California is planning to spend $40 billion to build a high speed rail system from San Diego to Sacramento. Advocates argue that high speed rail will save money and improve the environment, while critics claim it will waste money and harm the environment. What accounts for these diametrically opposed views about a technology that has been operating in other countries for decades? And what can transportation analysts offer to inform the debate?

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2018-02-14T21:40:54+00:00Categories: ACCESS 37, Fall 2010|Tags: , , |

Traffic Congestion and Greenhouse Gases

Matthew Barth and Kanok Boriboonsomsin

Surface transportation in the United States is a large source of greenhouse gas emissions, and therefore a large contributor to global climate change. Roughly a third of America’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions come from moving people or goods, and 80 percent of these emissions are from cars and trucks. To reduce CO2 emissions from the transportation sector, policy makers are primarily pushing for more efficient vehicles, alternative fuels, and reducing vehicle miles traveled (VMT). Those who promote vehicle improvements have focused on building lighter and smaller vehicles (while maintaining safety), improving powertrain efficiency, and introducing alternative technologies such as hybrid and fuel cell vehicles. Alternative fuel possibilities include many low-carbon options such as biofuels and synthetic fuels.

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2017-05-26T23:34:03+00:00Categories: ACCESS 35, Fall 2009|Tags: , |

Introduction: Transportation Technologies for the 21st Century

Elizabeth Deakin

New technologies are transforming the way we plan, design, build, and operate transportation systems. Transport agencies use them to count traffic, detect crashes, collect tolls and fares, and manage transit operations and traffic signal systems. Travelers depend on traffic condition reports, electronic maps, on-board vehicle performance monitors, real-time transit arrival information, and a host of other services that did not exist a generation ago. Some of us are already driving hybrid vehicles or commuting in buses powered by hydrogen or biofuels. For the future, we all are counting on additional advances in transportation technology, not just to get us where we want to go, but also to reduce greenhouse gases, improve air quality, and support economic development.

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Saving Fuel, Reducing Emissions: Making Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicles Cost Effective

Daniel Kammen, Samuel Arons, Derek Lemoine, and Holmes Hummel

Cars and light trucks in the U.S. consume about eight million barrels of gasoline per day, more than total US petroleum production. They account for eighteen percent of national greenhouse gas emissions. Both motor vehicle gasoline consumption and emissions have been rising at about 1.5 percent per year. Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) could alter these trends. On a vehicle technology spectrum that stretches from fossil-fuel- powered conventional vehicles through hybrid electric vehicles to all-electric vehicles, PHEVs fall between hybrids and all-electrics. They have both gas tanks and batteries, like hybrids, and can run either in gasoline-fueled mode or in electric mode. Their batteries are much larger than batteries in other hybrids, and they can store electricity directly from the grid as well as electricity derived from regenerative braking, as do conventional hybrid vehicles. PHEVs combine the best aspects of conventional vehicles (long range and easy refueling) with the best attributes of all-electric vehicles (low tailpipe emissions and reduced petroleum use). Widespread use of PHEVs could reduce transportation-related GHG emissions, improve urban air quality, reduce petroleum consumption, and expand competition in the transportation fuels sector. Several companies now offer to convert hybrid vehicles to PHEVs, and several automakers have announced PHEV development projects.

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2018-02-07T23:15:19+00:00Categories: ACCESS 34, Spring 2009|Tags: , |

Moving Forward With Fuel Economy Standards

Lee Schipper

In the early 1970s, the American Petroleum Institute had a slogan: “A nation that runs on oil can’t afford to run short.” Yet at the beginning of 1973, the US relied on oil for 46 percent of its energy supply, of which 32 percent was imported. Today we import about two thirds of the oil we consume. The price of crude oil in early 1973 was around $3 a barrel, and gasoline cost 39 cents a gallon. In 2009 dollars, those figures are close to $15 a barrel and $1.85 a gallon. Crude oil prices in early 2009 were still almost three times higher than in 1973. However, the fuel cost for driving a mile is less today than in 1973, because cars are more fuel-efficient and it takes thirty percent less fuel to go a distance today than in 1973.

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2018-02-07T23:17:15+00:00Categories: ACCESS 34, Spring 2009|Tags: , |

Transforming the Oil Industry into the Energy Industry

Daniel Sperling and Sonia Yeh

When it comes to energy security and climate change concerns, transportation is the principal culprit. It consumes half the oil used in the world and accounts for almost one fourth of all greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In the United States, it plays an even larger role, consuming two thirds of the oil and causing about one third of the GHG emissions in the country. Vehicles, planes, and ships remain almost entirely dependent on petroleum. Efforts to replace petroleum, usually for energy security reasons but also to reduce local air pollution, have continued episodically for years— and largely failed.

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2022-10-11T19:31:14+00:00Categories: ACCESS 34, Spring 2009|Tags: |
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