California and other jurisdictions have been moving to reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT) as a climate solution. Yet some pro-sprawl interests question whether this is necessary, given the advent of electric vehicles. It’s fair to ask: if all vehicles are “zero emission,” do we really need to care any more about how much driving we do, in terms of the climate impact?
The answer is unequivocally yes, and here are the top five reasons:
- Gas cars will be with us for a long time. As the California Air Resources Board noted in the 2022 scoping plan appendix, even with a goal to have only zero-emission vehicles sold in the state by 2035, approximately 30 percent of light-duty vehicles on the road in 2045 will still burn fossil fuels. The less of that we burn through reduced driving, the better.
- Clean electricity generation still has a carbon cost. Even if we move to 100% electric vehicles, that energy has to come from somewhere. And if it’s large-scale solar or wind facilities, they come with their own energy inputs to manufacture, as well as land use impacts to deploy. For example, some studies conservatively estimate it takes 10 acres of solar panels to generate one megawatt of electricity, an hour of which could potentially power about 3,500 driving miles collectively. Using that land for electricity and not food production, carbon sequestration, or open space comes with significant climate costs.
- Low-VMT development patterns reduce carbon pollution from buildings. As CARB noted, infill development (as opposed to sprawl served by publicly-subsidized highways) uses an estimated 10 to 20 percent less residential energy, due to smaller unit types, sizes, and locations — not to mention reduced water use from less outdoor irrigation requirements, which come with their own energy footprint to ship and treat the water.
- Reducing sprawl and VMT preserves open space and working lands as a carbon sink. To achieve carbon neutrality by mid century or sooner, we’re going to need to bury carbon. Natural and working lands are a key part of that equation, as they provide opportunities to bury carbon in soils through natural processes. Developing these lands instead for high VMT sprawl can permanently foreclose that opportunity.
- Electric vehicles come with their own carbon footprint and pollution costs. While dramatically better for the environment than fossil fuel-powered cars, EVs still require significant energy to manufacture, and their use on the road can create particulate matter pollution through wear on the tires and brakes and by kicking up particulate matter from the road. They also require large-scale mining of lithium, graphite and other minerals, which creates local environmental and energy impacts.
I could also mention non-climate reasons for wanting to reduce VMT, such as the equity benefits of building more housing closer to jobs and services in order to reduce transportation costs that disproportionately hurt low-income residents. But I’ll stick with the climate benefits for now.
Overall, we do need to electrify 100% of our transportation modes from a climate perspective. But we also need to simultaneously reduce the demand for transportation by building better and smarter communities in walkable, affordable, and transit-friendly areas.
Without that reduced driving, our climate goals will be much harder to achieve.
Climate change news is often quite depressing, with frequent stories on the science and ever-worsening impacts. What gets lost in this otherwise important coverage is the amazing and inspiring tales of innovation and solutions happening all around us, in every sector and walk of life.
That’s why Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE), in partnership with the UC Berkeley School of Journalism, launched the podcast Climate Break, which tells stories of climate solutions in less than two minutes. Climate Break features interviews with compelling scientists, innovators, organizers, and leaders discussing breakthroughs, new approaches, and examples of progress on climate change. And it’s almost entirely student run.
Over the past two years, we have recorded interviews with climate leaders like former California governor Jerry Brown and Arizona governor (and former Homeland Security secretary) Janet Napolitano, youth activists protesting fossil fuels, corporate leaders pushing for proactive climate lobbying, and entrepreneurs building clean energy facilities in tribal communities and retrofitting internal combustion engine vehicles in Egypt into electric models, among many other solutions.
And as of this year, a new episode of the podcast airs every Thursday on NPR-affiliate KALW 91.7 FM in San Francisco, offering listeners “climate solutions in a hurry.” In fact, you can tune in or stream live today at 7:19am and 3:48pm PT to hear our newest episode. We hope to expand to more radio stations soon.
For more on the podcast and its origins, Berkeley Law News profiled me and CLEE Project Climate Director Ken Alex, who had the idea for the program. Ken also serves as the show’s executive producer, along with CLEE senior climate fellow Chandra Middleton, who supervises the student team that helps produce the clips and draft additional information on each topic on our website.
So if you’re looking for inspiring solutions to address the climate crisis in less than two minutes, subscribe to Climate Break today on our website or wherever you get your podcasts!
Tonight on State of the Bay, we’ll interview Josh Koehn, senior reporter for the The San Francisco Standard, on the scandal plaguing San Francisco’s homeless services.
Then we’ll chat with Michael Coren, Climate Coach columnist for The Washington Post, about how to live lighter on the planet. Bring us your questions about anything from cloth diapers to green funerals!
Finally, we’ll hear from Joslyn Rose Lyons, director of the documentary film Stand, on the price paid by an NBA player for not standing for the national anthem.
What would you like to ask our guests? Post a comment here, tweet us @StateofBay, send an email to stateofthebay@kalw.org or leave a voicemail at (415) 580-0718.
Tune in tonight at 6pm PT on KALW 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area or stream live. You can also call 866-798-TALK with questions during the show.
Trucks are by far the largest source of air pollution from vehicles in California, generating about 80% of carcinogenic diesel soot and 70% of smog-causing pollution, according to the Air Resources Board. And their impacts are unequal: communities of color and low-income communities situated near ports, distribution centers and warehouses — particularly in the Inland Empire — are more likely to bear the health costs.
As part of KQED Forum’s “In Transit” series this morning at 10am PT, I’ll discuss the scope of the problem and new efforts by the state to decarbonize the trucking industry. Joining me on the panel will be:
- Rachel Uranga, reporter covering transportation and mobility, Los Angeles Times
- Amparo Muñoz, former policy director, Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ) – and co-author of the letter urging Gov. Newsom to “Declare a Public Health State of Emergency in the Inland Empire”
Tune in or stream live!
Tonight on State of the Bay, we’ll talk to Emeryville Mayor John Bauters about how his city is able to meet its housing requirements, as well as about his priorities as chair of the Bay Area Air Quality Board and the Alameda County Transportation Commission.
We’ll also host a debate on whether San Francisco should ban e-collars for dogs. Are they abusive, or do they actually give dogs more freedom? We’ll hear the arguments for and against e-collars with Ren Volpe of Shock Free SF and Founder/CEO of GoDogPro.com and Michael Ellis of Michael Ellis School for Dog Trainers.
Finally, State of the Bay’s guest host Sarah Ladipo Manyika talks about her new book Between Starshine and Clay: Conversations from the African Diaspora.
What would you like to ask our guests? Post a comment here, tweet us @StateofBay, send an email to stateofthebay@kalw.org or leave a voicemail at (415) 580-0718.
Tune in tonight at 6pm PT on KALW 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area or stream live. You can also call 866-798-TALK with questions during the show.
Car sales data from 2022 is now out, and the results are encouraging. According to the Wall Street Journal, automakers sold 807,180 fully electric vehicles in the U.S. last year, or 5.8% of all vehicles sold, up from 3.2% a year earlier. And as E&E News reported (paywalled) 19 percent of new car purchases in California were zero-emission vehicles. This is a big increase from the 12 percent in 2021, according to the same California Energy Commission data, and a positive trajectory to a state-mandated goal of 100% zero-emission vehicle sales by 2035.
But only one EV company dominates. Tesla Motors accounted for 65% of total EV sales last year, down from 72% in 2021, but with no real competition in sight. Ford Motor Co. is a distant number 2 in sales at just 7.6% of the U.S. market, with Hyundai and affiliate Kia combined at third with 7.1% market share. In California, the top vehicles sold overall by a large margin were the Tesla Model 3 followed by Model Y, with combined sales of more than half of all EVs sold in the state. What’s more, Tesla earns large profit margins per vehicle compared to other automakers.
Other legacy automakers appear to be asleep at the wheel (so to speak). They are instead largely committed to making money on gas guzzlers, despite press releases and limited EV releases to the contrary. General Motors, for example, is allocating only 10% of a new $860 billion investment into EV development, according to Eletrek.
But not everyone thinks Tesla’s lead will continue. As Paul Krugman wrote in December after a stock price drop:
[I]t’s hard to explain the huge valuation the market put on Tesla before the drop, or even its current value. After all, to be that valuable, Tesla would have to generate huge profits not just for a few years but in a way that could be expected to continue for many years to come.
He cited the lack of obvious attributes that would give Tesla the kind of market dominance that we see with monopolistic companies like Apple or Google in their sectors.
But what Krugman and others miss is the significant technological advantage Tesla has right now over its competitors, in terms of charging speeds and user friendliness of the vehicles (Krugman admits he’s not a “car guy” and so likely hasn’t test driven EVs from different brands before to understand this difference).
But second, and perhaps most importantly, people like Krugman mistake Tesla as just a car company. But it’s not. It’s a fuel station operator, too, with the most significant build out of EV charging infrastructure in the world. What’s more, compared to the competition (third party charging companies rather than other automakers), Tesla’s chargers are higher-powered and more convenient and reliable.
But wait there’s more, as they say on the game shows. Tesla is also an energy storage company, with 152 percent growth last year in its stationary battery business. And it’s a solar roof company, though that latter business has largely been stalled in recent years. So when you package all of these business lines together, you’ll find a vertically integrated monopoly with a significant head start in essentially all of the climate-fighting tech that will dominate the future.
Yes, Tesla stock may be overvalued. But the perception behind it is quite justified. Other automakers need to catch up, as the 2022 sales data reveal, or they will face an existential threat to their survival — much as humans now do, thanks to their gas-guzzling products.
Aviation is responsible for over two percent of global carbon dioxide emissions and is one of the most difficult sectors to decarbonize. We discussed options for California to address the challenge in a Berkeley Law policy report released last year, called Clean Takeoff.
I’ll be on KQED Forum today at 10am PT to discuss the report and what to do about “greening” flying. This will be the first in Forum’s new series “In Transit,” where I’ll talk about key environmental challenges and opportunities facing California’s transportation sector over the coming year.
Hope you can tune in or stream live!
Tonight on State of the Bay, I’ll be hosting Jessica Wolfrom, environmental reporter for the San Francisco Examiner, for an update on San Francisco’s climate action plan. As my colleagues at CLEE analyzed in a report last year, the city may need up to $22 billion to meet its climate goals.
Then we’ll uncover the mystery and history of Alcatraz: the prisoners, protests, escapes and more. We’ll be joined by John Martini, author, historian and former Park Ranger on Alcatraz Island, and Karley Nugent, current Park Ranger on Alcatraz.
Finally, we’ll hear about another great bay area gem: The Pacific Pinball museum in Alameda, with Larry Zartarian, president of the Pacific Pinball museum.
What would you like to ask our guests? Post a comment here, tweet us @StateofBay, send an email to stateofthebay@kalw.org or leave a voicemail at (415) 580-0718.
Tune in tonight at 6pm PT on KALW 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area or stream live. You can also call 866-798-TALK with questions during the show.
Last week the news blew up (no pun intended) that a commissioner on the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission floated the idea of a potential ban on gas cooktops in kitchens. The issue is that these cooktops are increasingly linked to unsafe levels of indoor air pollution and childhood asthma.
However, despite an outcry from right-wing news organizations and various politicians, there is no movement afoot for the government to seize your gas range. If anything, the debate in states like California is about ending ratepayer subsidies for gas hook-ups to new construction and eventually to existing neighborhoods, rather than paying to upgrade them. Eventually, all-electric buildings will be the norm and offer consumers better, more efficient appliances that aren’t putting their health at risk.
Most of the technology to move to all-electric buildings is essentially invisible to us on a daily basis, such as your hot water heater, furnace, etc. But the kitchen cooktop is a deeply personal issue for some people, especially those wedded to cooking with gas.
Fortunately, a far superior technology exists for cooking: the magnetic induction range. I spoke to NPR’s Marketplace this week to discuss the technology, its pros and cons, and the logistical challenges for customers looking to install one. Hopefully this discussion is helpful for anyone interested in purchasing one, or at least getting to the bottom of what was a fake debate about a real issue.
Tonight on State of the Bay at 6pm PT, we’ll discuss Governor Newsom’s plan to address “price gouging” by the oil industry. Joining me will be Sameea Kamal, California politics journalist at CalMatters.
Then we’ll talk to Dr. Aric A. Prather, professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at UCSF, about his new book The Sleep Prescription: Seven Days to Unlocking Your Best Rest. He’ll share his science-backed strategies to help us all get a better night’s sleep.
Finally, we’ll hear about fun and festive holiday events happening around the Bay Area with Anne Schrager, author at Datebook and calendar producer for the San Francisco Chronicle.
What would you like to ask our guests? Post a comment here, tweet us @StateofBay, send an email to stateofthebay@kalw.org or leave a voicemail at (415) 580-0718.
Tune in tonight at 6pm PT on KALW 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area or stream live. You can also call 866-798-TALK with questions during the show.
