Smartly Plan Our Way out of Oil Addiction
Oil reached a historic high price of nearly $127 a barrel earlier this week, and average gas prices are soon expected to spike to more than $4 a gallon. Meanwhile, San Jose’s public transit ridership, telecommuting and commuting by bike or walking remain in the bottom half of the nation’s largest 50 cities.
The end of the cheap-oil era should provide San Jose and other urban centers unprecedented opportunities to reimagine and redirect community design and development so that its daily needs require less driving. Without significant changes, we’ll crash not only our economy, but our health and our planet. In California, transportation accounts for 41 percent of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions, primarily from cars and light trucks.
Driving solo
Between the late 1970s and 2001, average U.S. vehicle miles traveled per person rose more than 150 percent. Today the vast majority of Americans drive alone to work every day (77 percent in San Jose), drive their children to school, drive to go shopping, and drive and drive and drive.
Analysts at Shell and the chief executive of BMW predict that global oil supply will not keep up with demand beginning in two to 17 years, causing gas prices to reach unknown levels.
Not surprisingly, decades of cheap gas have had a devastating impact on America’s landscape. We jettisoned the best ideas of urban planning, including dense, walkable cities with shared public spaces.
But driving in America is not inevitable. More than 60 percent of New Yorkers commute by taking public transit, walking or biking. More than 40 percent of residents of San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Boston do the same. In Boston, 13 percent of commuters daily reap the benefits of the world’s oldest form of exercise: walking.
What works for older, denser cities is possible in the rest of the nation. Look at Denver. Five years ago, less than 5 percent of its residents used public transit, a rate similar to San Jose’s 4 percent ridership in 2006.
After Denver metro area voters in 2004 approved the largest public transit financing ballot measure in the nation’s history, a new light-rail line helped the city increase light-rail ridership more than 79 percent. Denver is on track to reaching its goal of 20 percent to 30 percent transit ridership, according to Mayor John Hickenlooper, who helped convince some 30 metro communities to back the forward-looking initiative.
The biggest step communities can take to overcome our driving addiction is to mandate higher density and mixed-use development. This will curb the unbridled exurban subdivision and mall sprawl that forces auto use for every perceived need.
Mixed-use development provides a variety of homes, jobs, shopping and parks in urban or suburban neighborhoods so people can live, work and play without necessarily driving.
Green development
The U.S. Green Building Council, creators of the wildly successful Leadership in Energy and Environment Design green building standards, will soon launch a Neighborhood Development pilot program. The program will certify developments as being more energy efficient by rating factors including density, access to public transit and walkability.
Such creative solutions can help mitigate climate change while reinvigorating the economy. Viable options to driving cut the percentage of income people spend on gas, while stanching the flow of billions of dollars to regimes in the Middle East, Venezuela and other nations. Reducing gas taxes for the summer, on the other hand, will only delay coming to terms with our destructive national addiction.
Skyrocketing world oil prices and potential global supply shortages provide critical opportunities for federal, state and local policy makers to invest in changes to get us out of our cars and re-connect our communities.
Warren Karlenzig is president of Common Current, a consulting firm in San Anselmo. He is the author of “How Green is Your City?” (New Society Publishers, 2007) and a new report, “Major U.S. City Preparedness for an Oil Crisis.”
Copyright 2008 San Jose Mercury News
As a peak oil planning consultant advising multiple municipalities (Portland, Eugene, Bellingham, etc.), I would encourage municipal planners to consider www.brightneighbor.com.
The full solution will be revealed at the International Conference
on Peak Oil and Climate Change: Paths to Sustainability
May 30 through June 1, 2008
http://sustainabilityconference.org/
Also, the Advisory Board to the International Institute for Ecological Agriculture helps us develop programs to meet the growing needs of our students and our planet. They include:
Daniel Claudio Martinez Carrera, Ph.D.
President Institute of Applied Neotropical Mycology
Editor, International Applied Mycology Magazine
Professor of Mycology, University of Mexico, Puebla Campus
William (Bill) C. Holmberg
Lt.Col. USMC (Ret.)
Chair, New Uses Council
Pushing Frontiers of the Biobased Economy
Héctor Sáez, Ph.D.
Environmental Program and Community Development and Applied Economics
University of Vermont
Jeannette Diaz-Veizades, Ph.D.
Co-Director, Harvest for Haiti
Executive Faculty, Saybrook Graduate School
Gar Smith
Editor Emeritus, Not Man Apart
Friends of the Earth
Ernest Callenbach
Author—Ecotopia & Ecotopia Emerging
Editor Emeritus, University of California Press
Bob Theis A.I.A.
Architect/ Permaculture Designer
Joe Jordan Ph.D.
Researcher/educator
NASA Ames Research Center
Noah Owusu-Takyi Ph.D.
President
Insitute of Tropical Agriculture-Ghana
Larry Korn
Editor/Translator
Author— One Straw Revolution
David Sutton Ph.D.
Ecological Biologist
President-The Antaeus Organization
Ryan Sarnataro
Treasurer/ ED emeritus
Ecologicial Farming Association
Felipe Montoya-Greenheck Ph.D.
Founder/Director —MILPA Foundation-Costa Rica
Daniel Robin
President Integrated Investments Intl.
Deborah Mytels
Outreach Director —Foundation for Global Community
They all agree that:
1. Almost every country can become energy-independent. Anywhere that has sunlight and land can produce alcohol from plants. Brazil, the fifth largest country in the world imports no oil, since half its cars run on alcohol fuel made from sugarcane, grown on 1% of its land.
2. We can reverse global warming. Since alcohol is made from plants, its production takes carbon dioxide out of the air, sequestering it, with the result that it reverses the greenhouse effect (while potentially vastly improving the soil). Recent studies show that in a permaculturally designed mixed-crop alcohol fuel production system, the amount of greenhouse gases removed from the atmosphere by plants—and then exuded by plant roots into the soil as sugar—can be 13 times what is emitted by processing the crops and burning the alcohol in our cars.
3. We can revitalize the economy instead of suffering through Peak Oil. Oil is running out, and what we replace it with will make a big difference in our environment and economy. Alcohol fuel production and use is clean and environmentally sustainable, and will revitalize families, farms, towns, cities, industries, as well as the environment. A national switch to alcohol fuel would provide many millions of new permanent jobs.
4. No new technological breakthroughs are needed. We can make alcohol fuel out of what we have, where we are. Alcohol fuel can efficiently be made out of many things, from waste products like stale donuts, grass clippings, food processing waste-even ocean kelp. Many crops produce many times more alcohol per acre than corn, using arid, marshy, or even marginal land in addition to farmland. Just our lawn clippings could replace a third of the autofuel we get from the Mideast.
5. Unlike hydrogen fuel cells, we can easily use alcohol fuel in the vehicles we already own. Unmodified cars can run on 50% alcohol, and converting to 100% alcohol or flexible fueling (both alcohol and gas) costs only a few hundred dollars. Most auto companies already sell new dual-fuel vehicles.
6. Alcohol is a superior fuel to gasoline! It’s 105 octane, burns much cooler with less vibration, is less flammable in case of accident, is 98% pollution-free, has lower evaporative emissions, and deposits no carbon in the engine or oil, resulting in a tripling of engine life. Specialized alcohol engines can get at least 22% better mileage than gasoline or diesel.
7. It’s not just for gasoline cars. We can also easily use alcohol fuel to power diesel engines, trains, aircraft, small utility engines, generators to make electricity, heaters for our homes—and it can even be used to cook our food.
8. Alcohol has a proud history. Gasoline is a refinery’s toxic waste; alcohol fuel is liquid sunshine. Henry Ford’s early cars were all flex-fuel. It wasn’t until gasoline magnate John D. Rockefeller funded Prohibition that alcohol fuel companies were driven out of business.
9. The byproducts of alcohol production are clean, instead of being oil refinery waste, and are worth more than the alcohol itself. In fact, they can make petrochemical fertilizers and herbicides obsolete. The alcohol production process concentrates and makes more digestible all protein and non-starch nutrients in the crop. It’s so nutritious that when used as animal feed, it produces more meat or milk than the corn it comes from. That’s right, fermentation of corn increases the food supply and lowers the cost of food.
10. Locally produced ethanol supercharges regional economies. Instead of fuel expenditures draining capital away to foreign bank accounts, each gallon of alcohol produces local income that gets recirculated many times. Every dollar of tax credit for alcohol generates up to $6 in new tax revenues from the increased local business.
11. Alcohol production brings many new small-scale business opportunities. There is huge potential for profitable local, integrated, small-scale businesses that produce alcohol and related byproducts, whereas when gas was cheap, alcohol plants had to be huge to make a profit.
12. Scale matters—most of the widely publicized potential problems with ethanol are a function of scale. Once production plants get beyond a certain size and are too far away from the crops that supply them, closing the ecological loop becomes problematic. Smaller-scale operations can more efficiently use a wide variety of crops than huge specialized one-crop plants, and diversification of crops would largely eliminate the problems of monoculture.
13. The byproducts of small-scale alcohol plants can be used in profitable, energy-efficient, and environmentally positive ways. For instance, spent mash (the liquid left over after distillation) contains all the nutrients the next fuel crop needs and can return it back to the soil if the fields are close to the operation. Big-scale plants, because they bring in crops from up to 45 miles away, can’t do this, so they have to evaporate all the water and sell the resulting byproduct as low-price animal feed,which accounts for half the energy used in the plant.
By using this now standard line, “while stanching the flow of billions of dollars to regimes in the Middle East, Venezuela and other nations,” the author shows himself to be a promoter of continuing BAU by other means–if only we focused growth in the right directions…
Pojer, have you been drinking ethanol too? You seem somewhat obsessed with it as a solution to our problems.
I am, and once you know the truth, you might be too.
By the way Heavy runner, check out this post at Lawns to Gardens… it will help you understand even more:
http://lawnstogardens.wordpress.com/2008/05/15/peak-oil-partially-solvedpeak-oil-partially-solved
COME ON . . . America isn’t addicted to oil —
America is run by those private few who control our natural resources —
NATIONALIZE OIL –
and get ELECTRIC CARS back on the road —
*************************************************
Alcohol is not a solution. Land will be used inefficiently to feed cars rather than feed people. The amount of energy required to create alcohol is not taken into consideration either. 100% alcohol used in an internal combustion engine is destructive as it is a solvent and therefore wears engine parts down much faster. If the entire State of Indiana grew nothing but corn for alcohol, it would only represent 10% of oour current oil needs. Alcohol production is driven by large agri-corporations who are lobbying Congress for subsidies. Alcohol will ensure our continued reliance on fossil fuels as it is mixed with fossil fuels to power our machinery.
Only electricty and hydrogen can replace the fossil fuel era.
Sigh. Another “America over-consumes” hit piece. Too bad the underlying premise is a bald faced lie or simply a huge mistake by someone who is numerically challenged.
“Between the late 1970s and 2001, average U.S. vehicle miles traveled per person rose more than 150 percent…..Today the vast majority of Americans drive alone to work every day ……. drive their children to school, drive to go shopping, and drive and drive and drive.”
We are talking residential here, and residential per capita increases in miles driven certainly have not increased 150%, I can not fathom where that number came from.
Since 1977 and 2007 commuting distance increased 30%. Yet increases in fuel efficiency more than compensated for that, so gasoline consumption on a per capita basis is lower than the late 70’s. In addition, much of the increase in miles travelled is due to population growth, over 40% in between the late 70’s and 2001. Yet even adding population growth to increase in commuting distance yields only 70% increas in miles driven. And there are fewer kids around today cruising than there were in the 70’s.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/steo/pub/special/2008_sp_02.html
Looking at overall energy consumption on a per capita basis, residential and transportation combined is less than a 10% increase over 30 years. Per capita gasoline consumption in this period is flat, meaning it has not increased at all, helped by increased fule efficiencies.
http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/89923.pdf
The propaganda keeps on coming. Bring it on.
Alexnosal, you are entitled to opinions but please draw from accurate sources.
Again, please consider the book, check out sections, understand your subject better. Pretty much everything you say is a myth that you are perpetuating.
Keep an open mind.
http://www.alcoholcanbeagas.com?bid=2&aid=CD8&opt=
Make all those people who drive gas guzzlers pay a surcharge for doing so. Reward those of us who bought fuel efficient cars and pay us a bonus for doing so. Demand higher fuel standards from Detroit. Put our best minds to work on alternative, renewable and green energy sources. Support the Apollo Alliance, which promises to create 3 million new “green collar” and good paying jobs. Stop building strip malls and shopping centers on the outskirts of towns that require driving to get to. Retool towns to be more pedestrian friendly. Bring back mass transit - trains and buses and other means of public transportation. Support initiatives that do so. Go to:
http://www.publictransportation.org/
to see what you can do to encourage your legislators to support more mass transit initiatives.
Be proactive. Do something. Rather than complain about high energy prices, be a part of the solution.
i know what’s wrong with america….we stopped helping each other,we stopped coming together…..let’s get america’s best minds together…WE CAN solve america’s energy crisis if we wanted to…..WE CAN DISAGREE,but we have to come together…and find out WHY we disagree without name calling and insults….THIS IS THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA ! let’s get to work !
Pojer, Brazil’s automobile population is only 5% of the U.S. Brazil is by far and away the largest producer of sugar cane in the world. Using Brazil as an example and to think alcohol is going to solve our fuel problems is not realistic, no matter how well intentioned it is.
alcohol might be a solution for Brazil, and other tropical/sub-tropical countries. Good for them!
The “Silver bullet” solution mentalility is just the search for an easy way out so we can continue to be as wasteful as we are now.
We have to change the way we live. Perhaps the time has come and the world is never going to be the same.
However, I lived through the same alternative energy craze in the 1970’s when oil was up around 80.00/barrel for a while, but once the price dropped back down to 28.00/barrel, the alternative energy, back to the land, eco movement died a quick death.
I have a library full of 1970’s alternative research some books I picked up as “DISCARDED” from tech college libraries. Research by professors like the long list provided by POJER, all paid for with public money all just gone to waste.
Will it be different this time? We will see.
High oil prices at least in part, due to finanical system crisis and speculation by investment banks and hedge funds battling with traditional banks and governments for supremacy. In the 1970’s the rise in oil prices was directly relate to the USA eliminating the final linkages between gold and the US dollar.