THE CAR OF THE FUTURE - The Power Surge: Energy, Opportunity, and the Battle for America's Future - page 111

that the technologies promised by boosters aren't ready for prime time.
Biofuels are tarred as taking food out of people's mouths and doing
more harm than good for climate change. And some security hawks
worry that adopting electric cars could leave the United States free of
oil but dangerously dependent on exotic minerals that are under foreign
control.

T he steep decline in U.S. gasoline consumption is due mostly to

one overwhelming factor: the rising price of fuel. If you're paying
two dollars for a gallon of gasoline, it might not be worth shelling out
an extra ten thousand dollars to buy a car that gets thirty miles a gal-
lon instead of i t een. If you're paying four dollars a gallon, though, it
certainly is. At the turn of the present century, anticipating stable oil
costs, the U.S. government projected that a gallon of gasoline would cost
about $1.65 for the next two decades. 10 h ings turned out dif erently.
h is is the biggest reason fuel consumption has been falling. It
takes time, though, for the full impact of higher prices to be felt
throughout the system. People don't junk their cars just because gas
is more expensive; they wait until it's time to replace them and buy
leaner models. Even then, their used cars usually remain on the road
(and one person's “new” car is ot en someone else's old one). Because
the typical car is driven for between ten and twenty years the full
l eet turns over slowly. 11 But high gas prices are making their mark,
and the trend has yet to fully run its course. Analysts who other-
wise dif er on important energy issues have looked at things like car
buying and driving habits and generally conclude that U.S. gasoline
consumption will fall gradually over the next decade or so. 12 If prices
crash, though, the pat ern may well reverse, though even then big
increases in U.S. fuel consumption aren't in the oi ng.
Yet if history is any guide, high prices alone probably won't bring
about dramatic drops in oil consumption. To be certain, economists
have an incredibly poor understanding of what prompts people to
change their car buying and driving habits. It's entirely possible that
the psychological impact of gasoline at a sustained four or i ve dol-
lars a gallon could encourage surprisingly radical change. But it's also
quite possible that it won't.