Americans Drive Further Than Anyone Else 

Vehicle Production Inches Up 

MICHAEL RENNER / Vital Signs May03 

pp.56-58

Global passenger car production grew 2 percent in 2002, to 40.6 million units.[1] This is still slightly below the 2000 peak output of 41.1 million. [2] Since 1950, annual car production has grown fivefold.[3] (See Figure 1.) Production of sport utility vehicles and other “light trucks” reached a record 15.8 million in 2002, 6 percent more than in 2001.[4] Revised estimates show the global passenger car fleet reaching 531 million in 2002.[5] (See Figure 2.) The United States has one quarter of the cars in the world.[6]

Reflecting continued overcapacity in the industry, passenger car production outpaced sales by almost 2 million vehicles, or more than 5 percent.[7] But light trucks continued to be popular, outrunning production in 2002 by more than 1 million (almost 9 percent).[8] Once primarily used for hauling loads, light trucks are now heavily marketed as passenger vehicles. But even more so than cars, they are increasingly important contributors to air pollution and climate change. In the United States, model-year 2001 light trucks emitted 2.4 times more smog-forming pollutants and 1.4 times more carbon than passenger cars.[9]

Driving a gasoline-powered car accounts for about 68 percent of the greenhouse gases emitted over the life of the vehicle, but producing and distributing the fuel on which it runs accounts for another 21 percent, while manufacturing the car itself contributes the rest.[10]

Automobile carbon emissions could be reduced significantly by boosting fuel efficiency. Yet fuel economy has remained flat since 1990 in the United States, after substantial improvements since the early 1970s.[11] Efforts to raise mandated fuel efficiency standards failed in the mid-1990s and again in 2002.[12] Carmakers exploit exemptions and loopholes in existing standards, and the Bush administration is considering tax measures that would provide more incentive for buyers to choose the biggest gas-guzzlers.[13]

In 1970, Americans drove some 80 million cars close to 1 trillion miles (almost 1.6 trillion kilometers), burning 5.25 million barrels of fuel per day (mb/d) and emitting 193 million tons of carbon.[14] By 2000, there were about 128 million cars—60 percent more. They traveled 2.3 trillion miles (a growth of 146 percent), consumed 8.2 mb/d of fuel (up 56 percent), and emitted 302 million tons of carbon (also 56 percent more).[15] (See Figure 3.)

In the rest of the world, car density relative to population is much lower than in the United States. In Western Europe and Japan, it is currently comparable to the level the United States reached in the early 1970s; in Eastern Europe, it is similar to that in the 1930s; and in other regions it is even lower.[16]

People outside the United States also use their cars less than Americans. For instance, the average car in the United States travels 10 percent more per year than a car in the United Kingdom, about 50 percent more than one in Germany, and almost 200 percent more than a car in Japan.[17] And Americans drive less fuel-efficient cars, so these figures understate the national differences in gasoline used for driving.[18]

The United States consumed 43 percent of the 19.1 mb/d of world gasoline use for all transportation purposes in 1999.[19] (This number overstates the U.S. share of road fuel use, however, because it does not include diesel fuels, which are popular in Europe.)[20] All in all, the carbon emissions of U.S. automobiles are roughly equivalent to those of the entire Japanese economy— the world’s fourth-largest carbon emitter.[21]

The leaders in fuel economy are Honda, Hyundai, Volkswagen, and Subaru. The U.S. “Big Three,” by contrast—General Motors, Ford, and Daimler-Chrysler—are among the laggards.[22] One analysis of the six largest carmakers also finds that the Japanese firms Honda, Toyota, and Nissan have a “cleaner” record with regard to smog-forming pollutants than the Big Three.[23]

To date, only Honda and Toyota have introduced “hybrid electric” cars (in which electric power supplements the internal combustion engine, which lowers fuel intake and pollutants). [24] Vehicles running on all different types of alternative power currently account for only a tiny share of the total car fleet. In the United States, fewer than 380,000 such vehicles were on the roads in 2001.[25]

Figure 1: World Automobile Production, 1950–2002 World Automobile Production, 1950–2002

Figure 2: World Passenger Car Fleet, 1950–2002

Figure 3: Distance Driven and Carbon Emitted by U.S. Automobiles, 1970–2000

World Automobile Production, 1950–2002 

Year 	   Production
(million)
1950 	   8 0
1955 	   11.0
1960 	   12.8
1965 	   19.0
1970 	   22.5
1971 	   26.5
1972 	   27.9
1973 	   30.0
1974 	   26.0
1975 	   25.0
1976 	   28.9
1977 	   30.5
1978 	   31.2
1979 	   30.8
1980 	   28.6
1981 	   27.5
1982 	   26.7
1983 	   30.0
1984 	   30.5
1985 	   32.4
1986 	   32.9
1987 	   33.1
1988 	   34.4
1989 	   35.7
1990 	   36.3
1991 	   35.1
1992 	   35.5
1993 	   34.2
1994 	   34.8
1995 	   35.5
1996 	   36.9
1997 	   39.1
1998 	   38.4
1999 	   39.9
2000 	   41.1
2001 	   39.8
2002(prel) 40.6

Source: DRI-WEFA, American Automobile Manufacturers Association, and Global Insight.

Notes

1. DRI Automotive Group, Global Insight, Global Production of Light Vehicles by Region & Country December 2002 (London: 2002), received from Colin Couchman, e-mail to author, 20 January 2003.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.; DRI-WEFA, Global Automotive Group, Global Sales of Light Vehicles by Region & Country December 2001 (London: 2001); Standard and Poor’s DRI, World Car Industry Forecast Report, December 2000 and December 1999 (London: 2000 and 1999); American Automobile Manufacturers Association, World Motor Vehicle Facts and Figures 1998 (Washington, DC: 1998).

4. DRI Automotive Group, op. cit. note 1.

5. Colin Couchman, DRI Automotive Group, Global Insight, London, e-mail to author, 21 January 2003.

6. Calculated from Ward’s Communications, Ward’s Motor Vehicle Facts & Figures 2002 (Southfield, MI: 2002).

7.Worldwatch calculation, based on DRI Automotive Group, op. cit. note 1.

8. Ibid.

9. Jason Mark, Automaker Rankings: The Environmental Performance of Car Companies (Cambridge, MA: Union of Concerned Scientists, September 2002), p. 1.

10. John DeCicco and Feng An, Automakers’ Corporate Carbon Burden (Washington, DC: Environmental Defense Fund, July 2002), Figure 9. These percentages are based on conditions in the United States.

11. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Transportation Energy Databook 22 (Oak Ridge, TN: October 2002), Tables 7.18 and 7.19.

12. Robert Bamberger, “Automobile and Light Truck Fuel Economy: Is CAFE Up to Standards?” Congressional Research Service, Issue Brief for Congress, Washington, DC, 26 July 2002; David E. Rosenbaum, “Senate Deletes Higher Mileage Standard in Energy Bill,” New York Times, 14 March 2002; Danny Hakim, “Tougher Rules Are Proposed for Gas Mileage,” New York Times, 13 December 2002.

13. Danny Hakim, “Bush Proposal May Cut Tax on S.U.V.’s for Business,” New York Times, 21 January 2003.

14. DeCicco and An, op. cit. note 10, Table A-1.

15. Ibid.

16. ORNL, op. cit. note 11, Figure 6.1.

17. Calculated from Federal Highway Administration, Highway Statistics 2000 (Washington, DC: 2000). Statistics are for the late 1990s.

18. Divergent fuel efficiency from Michael Renner, “Vehicle Production Declines Slightly,” in Worldwatch Institute, Vital Signs 2002 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2002), pp. 74–75.

19. U.S. Energy Information Administration, International Energy Outlook 2002 (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Energy, March 2002), Table E2.

20. Ibid.

21. DeCicco and An, op. cit. note 10, Figure 12.

22. Ibid., Table 3.

23. Mark, op. cit. note 9, p. 10.

24. Danny Hakim, “S.U.V. From Toyota in 2004 To Use Hybrid Technology,” New York Times, 2 January 2003.

25. Therese Langer and Daniel Williams, Greener Fleets: Fuel Economy Progress and Prospects (Washington, DC: American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, December 2002), p. 4.

source: http://www.worldwatch.org/brain/media/pdf/pubs/vs/2003_cars.pdf 6aug03