Increases in VMT dwarfed increases in gas mileage. Attempts to improve gas mileage are fruitless unless we can change our driving and living patterns. Realistic? Probably not? Necessary? Absolutely.

Someone in an earlier post suggested that the increase in VMT was not commensurate with increase in MPG. Wrong! Of course, it is debatable whether the two measures are dependent, but these VMT figures do suggest that we need to raise gas taxes -- trying to solve the problem with CAFE standards only deals with one side of the equation.

This also assumes, of course, that one thinks it is important to cut oil and carbon use. Otherwise, party on until the music stops.

Uh since 1960 population has gone up how much? Earth to dumbasses THINK!!!!!!!!!!!

Wintermane: Open foot, insert mouth, rinse, repeat.

Population of the US in 1960: ~180Million
Population of the US in 2000: ~280Million
Resulting in a ~55.6% increase in population.
Compare that to the 95% increase in CO2 emissions.

And since 1960 how many more people work? How many more 2 income households are there? How many more two even 3 job workers are there? And concider how many more of thse people now live in the city where everything has to be transported in from far away and how very little of it is local....

Baxk in 1960 guess how much stuff had to be trucked into cal... now how much stuff is?

No matter how eff the car or truck it gets 0 miles to the gallon in a traffic jam. Our roads are shit.

But continued GDP growth and the private invesment capital that comes with it is absolutely necessary if we're going to get alternative energy in the first place.

Talk about a paradox. Most less developed societies live off of so-called "alternative" energy. So, we develop and abandon what we already know and use, just so we can arrive where we were before?

The whole reason that the environment has been trashed is because of modern economic development. It's a good thing to keep that in mind.

Poverty kills. Lack of modern economic development kills. Go live like the Amish if you want.

Funny. You were giving me a lecture about reductio ad absurdum just yesterday, and here you trot it out yourself.

So, if poverty "kills", how did humans make it to the Industrial Revolution?

And if infant mortality is a metric you're interested in, then why do we have the same rate as Cuba, even though their per capita GDP is about 1/10 of ours? We even have similar life expectancy rates to theirs, as well as Jordan, which has an even lower per capita GDP.

Amish, as long as you're mentioning them, too, have no different life expactancy than other Americans, and my understanding is they have very low infant mortality rates.

But that's neither here nor there. The question was whether it was fair to say that modernization itself is the cause of the main environmental problems we now face, and how it's a bit strange to say we need more wealth to enable the use of "alternative" energy, even though much less advanced nations and cultures run just fine on "alternative" energy. Seems to me we have more than enough wealth and technology at this point to handle the problems. The issue is simply that we aren't doing it enough.

This rise in CO2 output is a case in point. It is more inertia than some "natural" outgrowth of economic growth.

The question was whether it was fair to say that modernization itself is the cause of the main environmental problems we now face, and how it's a bit strange to say we need more wealth to enable the use of "alternative" energy, even though much less advanced nations and cultures run just fine on "alternative" energy.

A lot of that "alternative" energy are things like wood. Indeed, India fears that they're heading for a timber famine. The US was in a similar position in the early part of the last century, before we started using oil in any great amounts for transportation, or natural gas for heating. There is a lot of abandoned farmland and pastures out there that has returned to forest.

I don't claim that our modern world is not without costs. We have done a great deal the past 40 years to clean up our act, though I feel we've gone as far as is reasonable. I'm not about to hyperventilate over CO2, but I am hedging my bets for algal oils because of peak oil.

Here's another reason why I'm not so concerned over CO2. This paper was published in the June 30 issue of the International Journal of Climatology: "The Geoprofile metadata, exposure of instruments, and measurement bias in climatic record revisited", by Rezaul Mahmood, Stuart A. Foster and David Logan.

Mike, those pictures aren't showing up.
As for the CO2 discussion - look at how much the north polar ice caps have retreated in the last 30 years. This is already having tangible effects on the northern, arctic climates. CO2 is a problem and needs to be dealt with.
As for the whole question of 1960, well let's put it simply: IF technology hadn't improved since then, then MAYBE, wintermane, would you have a point. But technology has improved. Emissions controls are MUCH more stringent. And yet, our increase in CO2 is greater than our population growth. This is indeed upsetting.

If road building had kept up with road useage needs then yes we wouldnt be in this situation but... Alot of places simply dont have the road infrastructure needed to support thier working and consuming populations. As a result on top of more stuff and people moving about rhey are wasting far more energy doing it via stop and go traffic.Its a snowballing effect. More people more stuff more time in cummute bigger car to handle cummute without back pain or death... mores tops and starts.. far less gas milage even as cars get better...

The big things I notice are the long commutes leading to larger more comfy cars... also massively more stuff moving about... id say there are 200x as many trucks on the road today as back in the 70s much less then 60s and about 8x as many workers. why a deadicated commuter car with a single uber comfy ergonomic seat up front hasnt been made I duno.

Our inefficient, over-consumption life style has created massive increases in GHG in the last 50 years and will create major climate changes in the next 50 years if we do not change.

Life expectancy is going downward in USA and parts of Canada due to ever increasing pollution and poor strained health care. Higher GDP is not always the best answer. Even Cuba is doing better with 1/10 our GDP

USA and Canada have all what it takes to clean up our act and reduce per capita GHG by 50% while maintaining our high standard of living.

North American built, cleaner more efficient, individual and mass transportation vehicles, houses, offices, stores, fireplaces, appliances, recreation vehicles, electrical plants, alternative energy plants, wind turbines, solar panels etc etc could reduce OIL imports to zero (in USA), eliminate the needs for future OIL wars, provide jobs and cleaner air for generations to come.

Why do we always (still) want bigger (often subsidized) gas guzzlers, drive like kids, pollute the area with noisy mufflers, eat and get fat like .... to prove that we have a superior life style?

It is not GWB's fault. We have the government we voted in and we deserve. As individuals, we have to grow up.

Take 20 eople from age 15 to age 90 and have each of them drive a set of cars from very small to very large in a standard commute in the 60s and then 70s then 80s \then 90 and then now.. from going 85 with few around to zillions on and stop and go today... From the cars of the 50s to the cars of today.

You will then know exactly why.