Let’s admit it, we love our transportation system. Americans drive some of the largest vehicles available including Hummers, sports utility vehicles, and huge 4×4 trucks. American’s also drive some of the most expensive luxury and sports cars ever seen including Bentleys, Ferraris, Lamborghinis, Lexus, and Mercedes-Benz vehicles. All of these powerful, fast, and luxurious vehicles not only come with a costly price, but they also come with a cost to our environment. People in the United States and Europe witness and experience the effects of skyrocketing prices for gasoline. Today, with our increasing use and dependency on oil, many issues arise. How much petroleum is left to produce? What are our alternatives for energy? What is and will happen to global warming if we continue our dependency for oil or utilize alternative energy sources? The truth is, the Earth can only provide a finite amount of resource for us to use. So should we continue drilling our planet’s resources away just so we can continue living like we are today, or should we invest the time and money so we can continue living?
Energy is what allows us, as humans, to move and do work. But energy is also what drives our world and our economy. Unfortunately, like many things, energy is not free or without consequences. As seen at the gas pumps and on Wall Street, the price of oil has increased dramatically over the last decade. The United States along with other industrial countries are experiencing a never-ending increase in the demand for oil. Sadly, the world is on a path where the demand for petroleum products will surpass the supply available for distribution unless vast amounts of oil are discovered.
This is where my opinion comes in. Many of our United States politicians are, well, OLD! I am not saying old age is such a bad thing, in fact a lot of wisdom and knowledge come with age. But what do these politicians know about the future. Many are probably still incapable of using a computer, but when it comes to the future, we need a younger voice. This is where you and I come in. Like Time Magazine stated, “You” and I are the person of the year, so lets make our opinions and actions a part of it too. I have seen many of the United States goals and actions towards short-term gains rather than long-term gains. Our current president (George W. Bush) needs to admit that global warming is happening and we are part of the cause. President Bush, when asked whether he would watch the “An Inconvenient Truth”, responded: “Doubt it.” He later stated that “we need to set aside whether or not greenhouse gases have been caused by mankind or because of natural effects.” Gore responded by saying, “The entire global scientific community has a consensus on the question that human beings are responsible for global warming and [Bush] has today again expressed personal doubt that that is true.” We need more politicians who are willing to put their political statue on the line and stand up for the future. This may be a stereotype, but I think that a majority of the politicians don’t even care about taking a more aggressive stance on the future since they figure they will be dead before anything bad happens. Politicians need to worry less about their votes and more about the issues at hand.
So I offer a few suggestions to slow down the growth of global warming. I admit, some will be very hard to impose and may fringe upon a few corporations rights, but it is well needed. Rather than trying to drill our way out of the problem, we must find long-term methods. Drilling for additional oil will only further addict our dependency on oil and will only solve the problem temporarily. Auto-maker corporations must be given stricter standards on the creation and selling of their vehicles. All vehicles must come with a minimum miles-per-gallon (mpg) limit. For example, all vehicles must get at least 60 mpg. Humans have come such a long way in all science and technology fields but why not the automobile field? Could it be of greed? Corruption? Hidden deals with oil companies? We need to change our way of life? Do we really need a V8 engine (unless we are towing heavy loads). How about V6 engines? I doubt an average family will ever need that much power. How about all vehicles being equipped with a maximum of a 4-cylinder engine? I know this might be hard for some of you performance-type or large extended-cab trucks and SUV’s, but do you really need that large vehicle? I know that America is all about living a luxurious life, but that current life of luxury is what is going to bring us to our knees someday. Now that we have the 4-cylinder engine, do we really need to go over 90 miles-per-hour (mph)? Auto-makers should also create vesicles that cannot go over 90 mph. Leave the speed vehicles to the police, firefighters and ambulances. This alone will cut down on so much exhaust and wasted use of gasoline and oil.
Next, we need alternative methods of fueling. Being able to have a variety of fueling such as ethanol, electric, nuclear, solar power, H2O power, etc. will enable not only a competitive price among corporations, but will also cleaner methods of energy. I know these changes sound dramatic, but there I have yet seen a promising technology or idea that will slow down global warming and our addition to oil. In order to solve the drastic problem we created, we have to start at square one. America is often called the “land of opportunity”, but know we need a “land of choices and action”. The action that changes the way we fuel our cars and use energy, the choice to purchase different fuels for your vehicle, the choice to purchase better vehicles that are made to run longer before refueling, and the ability to protect the world we live in for our children and grandchildren from these actions of ours. Sure, the industrial revolution we had in the early 1900’s were great, but now we need to have an industrial evolution to reverse many of the threatening effects we have weighed on our planet Earth for the past few hundred years.
The world is faced with a very important issue that will affect generations to come. But many people with the perspective of only economic gain and common short run outlook views such as “we’ll all be long dead before anything severe happens†or “the world is so large we cannot possibly have any effects on it†are heavily hindering and delaying the world to take action. If hydrogen fuel-cell hybrid vehicles were to actually be implemented in the United States, it would take approximately fifty-five years to have an effect from the time of manufacturing to the sales of the hydrogen hybrid automobiles. Consequently, if the United States and the world do not take action immediately to implement alternative energy and to prevent further global warming, the world may be pushed back into another “dark age†of war, technological regression, famines, blistering heat, economic collapse, and a swarm of infectious diseases.
