Oil Consumption is Rising, Imports are Skyrocketing, and Our Vehicles Are to Blame

Overview

Auto companies have developed a host of new fuel-saving technologies and innovations, but for the most part they haven't put them into widespread production. Congress, the White House and state governments have the power to make them do it. As consumers and voters, so do we.

On these pages is a look at technologies that will cut oil use and pollution a lot, but only if they're widely used. By expanding production of gasoline-electric hybrids and making improvements in conventional vehicles, automakers could raise the fuel efficiency of new vehicles to 40 miles per gallon within a decade and 55 mpg by 2020.

Doing this in combination with increasing our reliance on renewable fuels and other oil-saving measures could cut our projected oil demand in half by 2020, and save consumers almost $30 billion per year.

The oil savings we could achieve by that time, more than 2.5 million barrels every day, would equal our total current imports from the Persian Gulf. These fuel efficiency improvements would also cut billions of tons of global warming pollution.

America can break the chain of oil dependence. The big automakers have heavy-duty bolt cutters in their tool chest. So does our government. Our job is to get these tools off the shelf.