Solutions to the Climate Crisis — 3
Revisiting this pie chart, transportation is 40% of California’s GHG emissions, and fully half including oil production and refining. Passenger vehicles are over 70% of Transportation and therefore our main focus; their GHG share must go to zero. How? Drive less plus all vehicles must be zero-emissions.
1. Drive Less — Transit, Biking, Walking, Passenger Rail, Infill Development, Incentives
The first choice is to drive less, and instead walk, bike, use transit, carpool, or work from home. “Complete streets” for safe walking and biking, and good transit, help more people do these, as do financial incentives to not drive. Dense infill development puts more people within convenient walking, biking, or transit distance of where they’re going.
The University of California Institute of Transportation Studies’ (UC ITS) 2021 report, “Driving California’s Transportation Emissions to Zero,” with an all-star team of authors from four UC campuses, includes the same actions to reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) (p. 11):
- Transit-oriented development/densification
- Active transportation
- Public transit investments, expansion, and incentives
- Transportation and parking pricing
- Transportation demand management (TDM) strategies
Is that enough? Why do we need EVs too? Because — in contrast to the much-less-car-dependent urban European lives of J.R. Flaherty in London and Jack Albrecht in Vienna that I’ve conversed with here on Medium — the United States has grown around automobile-dependent suburban sprawl for a century. This 1920s photo is an early example, of Los Angeles’ “Miracle Mile” Wilshire Boulevard extension beyond the limits of its old streetcar lines, which was followed by the first U.S. freeway in 1940 and a ten-fold increase in population.
The result is three-fourths of U.S. commuters drive alone to work (U.S. Census), but substantially fewer do in compact, walkable, transit-oriented cities like San Francisco (29%). Real-world data shows up to a 2/3 reduction in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) between auto-oriented suburbia and medium density neighborhoods (we’re talking 2–4-story apartments, not Manhattan).
2. Electric Vehicles and Charging
All remaining car trips need to become zero-emissions. The average car lasts 15 years; as they are replaced they need to be EVs. See my separate Medium post on EV models and charging for more.
3. Passenger Rail
Jet plane flights have big GHG emissions and cannot substitute cleaner fuels. The solutions are to fly less and to improve U.S. passenger rail service as an alternative to match Europe’s and Asia’s for shorter trips.
4. Freight
Finally, trucks from local delivery vans to semi-trucks need to become zero-emissions. Freight via rail is also more energy-efficient than trucks, so more loads should go by rail, and ideally rail lines will be electrified.
The good news is we know the solutions; many governments* are finally taking climate seriously; clean technology wind, solar, and batteries are getting cheaper; and many people want convenient urban living with less driving if they can find it. Our role is to help these happen faster!
*California’s share plus the other “Section 177 States” who share California’s clean car rules represent over 1/3 of U.S. auto sales (CARB), enough to have a big market impact.
Here are the other three posts in this series:
(Updated 3/18/22)
