Energy Literacy Advocates Newsroom
American Infrastructure: Short-Term Memory
Monday, September 28, 2009
1885 and 1886 were formative years for the car. Gottlieb Daimler, in 1885, invented a prototype of today's gas engine, while 1886 saw the first patent issued for a gas-powered car, to Karl Benz. From 1900 to 1915, the number of cars in America leapt exponentially.
Yet, up to 1920, the railroad industry was king of American transportation. It wasn't until 1940 that buses began replacing streetcars in urban settings. In 1960, only 20 percent of American households had two cars.
Why the lesson in history and statistics? Because, despite the current American houshold average of 2.28 cars (that is, 35 percent of reported households had three or more cars), our obsession with the automobile is a relatively new romance. Likewise our dependence on oil. And these are key facts in reminding ourselves that a short-lived romance can be broken/changed/altered. What we have isn't set in stone. We seem to forget that our country predates the discovery and mass utilization of oil.
This doesn't mean we have to shirk the car instantaneously. A look back at the history of the car gives us hope for alternatives - in 1807 Francois Isaac de Rivaz designed an internal combustion engine that ran off a mix of hydrogen and oxygen. The first diesel engines were planned to run off peanut oil.
Utilizing efficiency and innovation are our key strategies toward charting a sustainable path forward in energy policy for the US.
To read about diversification going on in the auto industry, visit treehugger.com by clicking here.
Labels: automakers, efficiency, energy sources, oil supply
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Amanda Voss
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