Transportation in a Climate-Constrained World

by Andreas Schafer, John B. Heywood, Henry D. Jacoby, Ian A. Waitz

Overview

A discussion of the opportunities and challenges involved mitigating greenhouse gas emissions from passenger travel.

In the nineteenth century, horse transportation consumed vast amounts of land for hay production, and the intense traffic and ankle-deep manure created miserable living conditions in urban centers. The introduction of the horseless carriage solved many of these problems but has created others. Today another revolution in transportation seems overdue. Transportation consumes two-thirds of the world's petroleum and has become the largest contributor to global environmental change. Most of this increase in scale can be attributed to the strong desire for personal mobility that comes with economic growth. InTransportation in a Climate-Constrained World, the authors present the first integrated assessment of the factors affecting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from passenger transportation. They examine such topics as past and future travel demand; the influence of personal and business choices on passenger travel's climate impact; technologies and alternative fuels that may become available to mitigate GHG emissions from passenger transport; and policies that would promote a more sustainable transportation system. And most important, taking into account all of these options are taken together, they consider how to achieve a sustainable transportation system in the next thirty to fifty years.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262296892
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	04/17/2009
Series:	The MIT Press
Sold by:	Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Format:	eBook
Pages:	356
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Andreas Schäfer is Director of the Martin Center for Architectural and Urban Studies at the University of Cambridge and a Research Affiliate at MIT.

John B. Heywood is Sun Jae Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Sloan Automotive Laboratory at MIT.

Henry D. Jacoby is Codirector of the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change and Professor of Management in the Sloan School of Management at MIT.

Ian A. Waitz is Jerome C. Hunsaker Professor and Department Head, Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, at MIT.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Andreas Schåfer and his colleagues provide a clear and concise overview of the role that transportation plays in creating some of the global environmental challenges confronting us and look at the sort of technology that can help us circumvent the dangers of global climatic change. In doing this it brings within a single set of covers a wealth of information, systematically presented,and, importantly, written in a way that can be followed by a non-specialist. It is a very welcome addition to the literature."—Kenneth J. Button, Director,Aerospace Policy and Management Center, School of Public Policy, George Mason University