I believe it's mostly efficiency measures. Americans are collectively driving more now than in 2007: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M12MTVUSM227NFWA https:

I believe it's mostly efficiency measures. Americans are collectively driving more now than in 2007: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M12MTVUSM227NFWA https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/M12MTVUSM227NFWA Note that petroleum consumption by transportation is nonetheless lower now than circa 2005 (eyeballing the graph): https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=30652 https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=30652 Coal-to-gas switching in electrical generation (and increased renewables generation, to a smaller extent) also reduces the primary energy consumption for a given level of generation. You might need 3 megajoules of primary (thermal) energy to produce 1 megajoule of electricity using coal-fired generation. It's more like 2 megajoules of primary energy using gas-fired generation in a modern combined cycle plant. And it's just 1 megajoule of primary energy to deliver 1 megajoule of electricity with wind power or PV (they're not heat engines; the electricity is the whole of the energy). Someone can consume exactly the same amount of electricity now as in 2007 but the changing generation mix would still reduce the primary energy input required to generate that electricity.