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> The center also said U.S. car sales will drop by up to 1.3 million units annually due to the Trump administration's trade policy This is incredibly good news
by jonahhorowitz 6y ago
> The center also said U.S. car sales will drop by up to 1.3 million units annually due to the Trump administration's trade policy
This is incredibly good news, if true. We need to reduce the number of cars in the US if we are going to have any chance of confronting climate change.
- 8ytecoder 6y agoNot without a change in the underlying dynamics including infrastructure. Used car sales and prices have dropped drastically and so people would just keep their old inefficient cars longer than ever before. Remote working if it sticks might contribute more to car reduction.
- onion2k 6y agoOnly if there's a corresponding drop in the number of cars in use. It could be that people keep their old, inefficient, polluting cars for on the road for longer rather than replacing it. That would be bad for the environment.
- AnthonyMouse 6y agoThere is some disagreement about whether this is actually the case. It takes a lot of resources to build a new car. Meanwhile the average passenger cars has been above 30MPG for 15 years now and the newer ones aren't dramatically better than that. So you only come out ahead with a new car if you put a lot of miles on it. But then that's still conflating "new" and "efficient" -- a 2004 Prius still gets better mileage than the new car average. This doesn't apply to electric cars, which do use dramatically less petroleum (i.e. none), but they're mostly already made in the US, so making petrol cars cost more may actually be an environmental advantage because more people will buy electric.
- mensetmanusman 6y agoPeople are driving drastically less.