Environmental Engineering Reference
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imports, the savings total somewhere between i ve and twenty-three
dollars. h at's equivalent to between two and nine billion dollars a year
for every million-barrel-a-day cut in U.S. demand for crude.
One might go so far as to wonder whether these benei ts from reduc-
ing oil consumption are reasons to oppose any ef ort to boost U.S. oil
production; at er all, more U.S. oil output lowers oil prices, and U.S.
oil use rises as a result. But the impact of higher U.S. oil production
on U.S. oil consumption would be small. More U.S. oil production will
always lower imports, even if consumption rises as a result.
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And when
it comes to the biggest economic and security vulnerabilities stemming
from U.S. oil consumption, all of which arise from the massive amount
of money the United States spends on oil of all origins, increased pro-
duction remains on solid ground. Economists i nd that every 1 percent
drop in the price of oil yields less than a 1 percent increase in U.S. oil
use.
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h at means lower oil prices resulting from increased production
always lead to lower total spending on oil.
It is also sensible to ask about the reverse. Increased U.S. oil produc-
tion benei ts the U.S. economy and national security. But cut ing U.S. oil
consumption, by lowering oil prices, would undermine U.S. oil output
(if only a lit le bit). Could that be fatal to the benei ts of using less oil?
h e answer is again no. It is impossible for cuts in U.S. oil use to under-
mine U.S. oil production so deeply that spending on oil imports (one
root of U.S. economic and security vulnerabilities) doesn't drop.
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Nor
would the fact that Americans would make less money selling oil be a
problem. Workers who would otherwise be pumping crude could use
their time to produce other valuable things; capital that would otherwise
be used for oil-drilling equipment could be applied to other productive
pursuits; scientists and engineers might stop directing as much energy
toward inventing new oil-drilling technologies and instead steer it toward
breakthroughs in other i elds (not just energy); and the United States
would still have the oil it needed to run its economy—at lower cost.
So when exactly do gains from greater fuel economy outweigh the
costs? Answering that question can help draw the line between smart
pushes for greater automobile ei ciency and foolish ones. To see how,
drill down on an example. h e typical U.S. driver tallies about thirteen
thousand miles on the road every year.
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Imagine that she starts with
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