Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Germany (in 2004)
and Japan (in 2006).
Finally, in 2008, China
overtook the US to
become world leader,
with 9.3m sales of
new vehicles (cars and
trucks), compared
with 8.7m new vehicle
sales in the US. China
increased its lead in
2009 with an amazing
46 percent rise in new
vehicle sales, reaching
13.6m, as compared
with 10.4m for the US.
On current trends,
there could be 250m
vehicles - the same as today's entire US car fleet - on China's roads by
2030. This would be a huge total addition to world car emissions, even
though China has introduced fuel efficiency norms that will reduce emis-
sions from individual cars. As with everything in China, numbers tend to
overwhelm unit efficiency. India already has more vehicles on its roads
than China. It doesn't have the same rate of growth, but to maximize sales
to the less well-off, India's Tata group has introduced the so-called $1000
car.
It would be very hard to put the brakes on the mobility revolution and
to dampen the demand for personal freedom that having one's own car
seems to offer - traffic congestion aside. Developing countries will go
through the same transport revolution that developed countries did. The
car can't be uninvented; it can only be reinvented.
And, of course, the travel revolution has now long since taken to the
air in developed countries, with budget airlines providing cheap flights:
demand for similar services from the middle-classes of the develop-
ing world is only to be expected. In theory, modern technology such as
teleconferencing, a useful electronic subsitute, ought to replace some of
the need for travel. But the evidence is that, in practice, one is rarely a
substitute for the other. Indeed, it may be that they are not substitutes,
but go together. For teleconferencing or videoconferencing appears to
work best between people who have already met each other in the flesh.
The world's least expensive automobile, the Tata
Nano, is often referred to as the $1000 car (although
its price tag is actually about the equivalent of
US$2500).
