3 ms·

So kinda like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_wave http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_wave ?

• to3m 14y ago
  Fascinating quote from the Wikipedia page: "In the UK, in 2009, it was revealed that the Department for Transport had previously discouraged green waves as they reduced fuel usage, and thus less revenue was raised from fuel taxes" :) I wonder if any of the planners have been thinking the same way about this project. EDIT: let me guess. Burn 1 US gallon of petrol = 17.68 US pounds of CO2 (see http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=307&t=11 http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=307&t=11) = 8.02 kg. 1,000,000 tonnes is 1,000,000,000 kg, so 124,688,279 US gallons of petrol (so 471,996,258 litres, or 3m barrels, or something like 0.04% of all US annual consumption). The California petrol tax per US gallon is $0.36 (http://www.boe.ca.gov/sptaxprog/spftdrates.htm http://www.boe.ca.gov/sptaxprog/spftdrates.htm), so this amounts to $44m. (Don't forget my calculations are quick and dirty.) So that's hardly nothing, but compared to the rest of the budget, a mere drop in the ocean, and probably worth doing if it speeds traffic flow and if reduced spew of noxious poisons and greenhouse gases is a policy goal. (The same calculation run across the whole of the UK would probably produce more compelling numbers, suggesting that the green wave is a poor idea for the government - but reduction in greenhouse gases is a current policy.)
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