Some reprieve in Jan VMT
Posted by Stuart Staniford on March 28, 2006 - 1:37am
Topic: Economics/Finance
Tags: peak oil, vmt [list all tags]
- December global oil production recovered from the hurricanes to match the May peak, so a little more oil was available than in November
- January is historically always the month of lowest driving
- The weather was unusually warm in January, which both reduced the demand for heating oil, freeing up oil for making gasoline, and also makes people want to drive more.
Still, it's probably good news for Q1 GDP (at least for those who think economic growth is a good thing).
More background here.
Update [2006-3-28 2:45:24 by Stuart Staniford]:
Here's retail gas prices over the same period. On the whole, it would appear that prices so far in 2006 have increased at least as much over 2005 as that year did over 2004. This would appear to offer further support for the idea that January 2005 is more likely a weather-related anomaly than a harbinger of a new trend.
Update [2006-3-28 3:31:20 by Stuart Staniford]:
A commenter asked about fuel efficiency - has it increased as a result of the run-up in gas prices in the last few years? We know there's started to be some negative impact on the sale of large SUVs, and some positive impact on the sale of small cars.
As far as I know, no official body tracks fuel efficiency on a close and recent basis - the EIA is only up to 2003. However, I made my own approximate indicator by dividing the FHWA VMT by EIA monthly gasoline supplied. Note this has several flaws that I freely admit. The VMT numbers include diesel vehicles (there are no monthly figures that separate by grade of vehicle), but the gasoline numbers do not include diesel (which I do not believe is well separated from heating oil in EIA statistics). This is a moderately significant distortion in the absolute number (since about 8% of VMT is large trucks IIRC), but hopefully is not a big issue in comparing month to month over short time periods. The other main issue is probably imperfect matching of time periods - gasoline supplied in one month may be powering vehicle miles driven in the next month.
Anyway, for what it's worth, the data show no sign whatsoever of improving fuel efficiency in the deployed US vehicle fleet through Dec 2005:
I speculate that the obvious seasonal effect in the graph is due to a higher mix of long-haul freeway driving in the summer months.
Fuel efficiency in the US has been pretty much flat since 1990. Apparently, prices have not yet gone high enough to trigger another round of improvements:
I sure see a lot more 40+ mpg cars on the road than last year.
http://www.grinzo.com/energy/blog_entry_archive/2006/03/2006x03x29_5.html
It says that U.S. January gasoline consumption dropped 0.6% from a year ago. In conjuntion with Stuart's report that miles travelled was up 3.8% from a year ago, that points to about a 4.4% increase in MPG, which would be substantial.
Of course all these figures have a fair amount of uncertainty, and given Stuart's analysis showing no trend in increasing MPG throughout 2005, this sudden increase in January is rather suspicious. It will be very interesting to see if it carries on into February.
IN SS's MPG chart, it appears MPG is up almost 1 MPG, which would equal close to 4.4%.
Am I reading it right?
Personally I suspect that only the last summer SUV blowout sale may have very well compensated or even exceeded the effect of small cars number increase. IMO the shift is picking up but quite slowly. Here in Atlanta I see much more (and almost new) SUVs, minivans and old inefficient cars for sale than last year, and they seem to be sitting around for months.
Is this a significant response to the post-Katrina fuel prices? Probably. Light truck sales have recently been about half the market for passenger vehicles.
The US scrappage rate of cars and trucks combined was at the historic low of 4.5% but the scrappage rate for the light truck segment was only 4.1%.
Full Article behind this
I've been a lifelong car guy, so TOD is a bit painful for me. From what I've read recently, a stigma is developing in urban settings, and only among some people, against the use of large SUVs and pickups by those who don't need them for work. This, combined with the fuel penalty of SUV use, suggests that light trucks will be driven less in situations where there is a choice of a more fuel-efficient vehicle. I can't find a reference at the moment, but the fuel penalty of using an average light truck in place of an average car is about 42%. Using the light truck adds an extra 2 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions over a distance of 16,000 miles.
I write this singla data point (January 2006 VMT) off as meaningless.
However, earlier months and longer term averages, show little elasticity of demand for our beloved autos in the US, regardless of oil price.
I did hear a radio commerical in Phoenix for some developer of FAR exurbia (US Ranch ?) that was extolling the development that they just sold out "at the foot of the Granite Mountains" (whereever that is) and then talked about the "new plateau of elegant living" that was "closer to Phoenix".
So the worst villians are "hedging their bets". Not nearly enough though.
You are 100% that one month's figures mean nothing. However, as I look at the 12 month moving average graph, it seems to me that number of miles travelled during the most recent 12 months for which data is available has indeed levelled off, most likely in response to higher gasoline prices.
Although demand for gasoline is highly price inelastic in the short run, it has a much greater eleasticity over time. Nobody can know exactly what the long-run price elasticity of demand for gasoline in the U.S. is, but in all probability it increases not only over time but also at higher levels of price. Thus gasoline may be highly price inelastic over a price range of, say $1.50 to $3.00 per gallon, be somewhat more elastic from $3 to $5 per gallon, and possibly about unitary elasticity (over a period of several years) at a price of $5 to $10 per gallon.
In any case, the law of demand applies: Other things staying the same, a lower quantity will be demanded (purchased) at a higher price than at a lower price. In other words, the demand curve for gasoline is not a vertical line.
The issue of income elasticity of demand is a "whole 'nother beast" and there is no need to go there, except to observe in passing that as nominal national income increases, the demand (i.e. the whole demand curve) for gasoline increases.
Simple demand reduction due to customer preference and substitution (double price of green beans and see demand plummet immediately) is sadly lacking in gasoline/oil.
Double price of gasoline and see demand grow by 0.1% instead of ~1.7% y=o=y. NOT GOOD :-(
A lack of oil is going to have to seriously impact Americans on a broad scale, not just higher cost for gas, but a serious lack, before people will STOP wanting economic growth - and that still requires them to wake up. It is still years off.
Currently there is a glut of natural gas on the market in North America and if warm temperatures persist next winter, it will stay that way.
The wait list on the prius was 21 deep at our local toyota dealer, and they did not even have one in the show room. People are placing orders without a test drive, or in some cases, even seeing one up close.
Great car by the way - getting a legit 50 mpg
Your in an environmental blue state would be my argument. My daughter visiting from New Jersey noted the difference, but my town has probably the highest # of prius owners per capita, certainly the county, if not in the state.
I work in construction and driving the prius to a job still gets some comments and looks that reflect a V-8 mentality.
Our Rotary club of all 20 members has four hybrids, one being a home-made one courtesy of CalPoly University, San Luis Obispo, with a converted Fiat Spider body. The others are two Prius and one Insight.
Go over to the Central Valley (Fresno) and the numbers drop dramatically.
We're in agreement here. Vermont is definitely a blue state any way you look at it. My point is that we are starting to see some consumer behavior changes that will manifest themselves in the statistics later. I think 2006 will be the year that fuel efficient vehicles start to make a big comeback. Gas prices in the $2.50 range together with the vague uncertainty many Americans are feeling about energy (even if they can't label it - see recent CNN/USA today/Gallup Poll - http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/03/16/oil.poll/index.html), will change behavior, and I agree that it's likey to happen first in "blue" areas. Conferate's post below attests to this.
I get the same reaction at times with my prius. Additionally, going from a fire breathing f150 with the full off-road package to a prius in one fell swoop is difficult for some to absorb - I must be out of my head.
bicycle. You get practical utilitarian exercise to boot.
Of course by doing so you risk sinning against the gods of
finance and oil, and may have to do penance when you die. ;)
Chicago we get heat in the summer, bitter cold in the winter
with ice and snow. Plus we have lots of traffic. I ride
my trusty bicycle year-round w/o difficulty more than 100
miles per week. When gas prices shoot up, I am amused by
the poor slobs paying tons o cash to fill up their
metal cages. I laugh when I ride swiftly past the line of
metal cages sitting motionless in traffic.
When 300,000 demonstrators clogged the streets west of the
loop on March 10th, a busy Friday afternoon I was able to
find a way through the crowd and on to my destination w/o
any problem. Everyone else had to sit restlessly in their
cages in a seemingly endless traffic snarl-up from
the demonstration.
Pic I took from astride my bicycle of the demonstration
passing the corner of Jackson and Peoria
Someone over at PeakOil.com posted about going car-free in Chicago. He used electric bikes to get everywhere. It sounded so cool I considered doing it myself, but eventually came to the conclusion that it's just not possible here. We get more snow and ice than Chicago, we don't have enough traffic to slow vehicles down, and it gets dark way too early in the winter. I don't even feel comfortable walking on the sidewalk in winter or at night here. Forget biking.
Another thing that dissuaded me was that when I Googled commuter bike sites, it seems every site was "in memory" of some biker who'd been run over by a truck or something.
skydive telling me they refused to bounce, they would
instead "grab the grass". ;)
We all have to go some day. I'd like to live life to the
fullest, and cycling helps me do that. I like to think it
helps others by conserving fuel, cutting CO2 emissions
and the like. It may cost me dearly some day, but I'm not
sure that fate will be worse than what awaits those who
depend on those mechanical cages to ferry their sedentary
bodies from place to place.
In the end, I decided to buy a Toyota Corolla. I drive so little that buying a hybrid really didn't make sense. Besides, if the gas stations go dry in a year, I'd be really ticked off if I paid big bucks for a car. ;-)
You have come to a good solution that works for you. For me, I would never live in a place where it was not safe to bike. In Minnesota some of us have studded tires to help with snow and ice, and thousands (mostly students) bike year round. Of the bike fatalities in the seven-county area Metro area I know of during the past few years, every single one was due to gross recklessness--such as not stopping at a stop sign.
What's the matter, you want to live forever;-)
Pics of studded bicycle tires where I bought a pair.
Weirdly, a lot of native New Yorkers I knew were too scared to take the subway and insisted on taking the bus. I never understood that. The only thing I can figure is that they remembered the "bad old days," before the city starting cracking down.
I've commuted by bike for two-and-a-half years, both in a city (Calgary) and a small rural town (Stettler). In both cases, I was needlessly fearful of sharing the road with drivers. A bike often allows you to use roads (or sidewalks) that cars don't. You can choose your route to balance your concerns with traffic. I have never had a problem finding routes that either used low-traffic roads, wide shoulders, or had sidewalks that I was comfortable using.
This flexibility also carries over to weather. You're right that snow and freezing temperatures can make things more dangerous (as it does for cars), but my experience is that this is hugely exaggerated. When we get snow, I change my route to roads that are almost deserted and allow me to safely follow car tracks through the snow. During the spring thaw-and-freeze cycle, the most dangerous time to cycle, less traveled roads thaw less. This allows me stay off the more traveled roads until they've thawed completely.
This season, I've had to put my foot down exactly once. I've fallen only one day (the first day I commuted on snow) in my cycling commute career. I have never been nervous about a car hitting me. And I'm not some kind of thrill-seeker.
Honestly, if it were as dangerous as some make it sound, I wouldn't be doing it.
I think I may also be a victim of the mixed-use area I chose to live in (to shorten my commute). There are offices, stores, and businesses mixed with housing. Which is great, in one way. I can walk to the store, the post office, the local college (with its CSA farm), etc. The flip side is there are cars and trucks everywhere, even on the "back roads."
The guy from Chicago I originally talked took the train when the weather was too bad to bike. Sadly, that is not an option here.
Also, I suspect that, being female, I have different security concerns than you do. There are areas around here I would not bike through in broad daylight, let alone at night.
http://ghostcycle.org/
Someone over at PeakOil.com posted about going car-free in Chicago. He used electric bikes to get everywhere. It sounded so cool I considered doing it myself, but eventually came to the conclusion that it's just not possible here.
>
Leanan,
That was likely me. And you're right, a lot of places are more unfriendly to biking than Chicago. Chicago ranks high on surveys of cyclists and it's been improving over the last few years.
The suburbs of Chicago are more difficult to negotiate by bike than the city itself. Many suburbs have neighborhood streets that go in loops or end in cul-de-sacs. To go from a neighborhood to anywhere else requires going out onto a large high speed street or highway. These are dicey even on a fast electric bike.
But inside the city there are few places that can't be reached by quieter neighborhood streets. And many of the larger avenues have bike lanes.
It also helps to have good public transportation. When the weather is bad I ride a folding bicycle to an el train station (el stands for elevated although its a subway in my area - it's also electric!).
Todd Allen
Yup. Suburbs are designed to keep people from cutting through them. You often have to go miles out of your way, just to get to the next block.
I still plan to get an electric bike, but it will be in addition to my car, not instead of. I'm looking to get a folder, but I haven't decided which one yet.
Let me recommend the Brompton folding bike; I've been delighted with mine for the past four years. Recently I saw (for less money) a Giant folding bike that looked good, though not as compact as the Brompton, which conveniently folds into a large suitcase for air travel.
For electric bikes, I suggest go simple but not cheap. There is good stuff made in Germany and crap from China, surprise, surprise.
My brothers and I used to have those three-speed Sturmey-Archer shifters on our old Raleigh bikes, but they were bright metal. Even so, they took a lot of incidental abuse.
With the Xootr, I simply twist a drum near my right hand to shift.
My dealer didn't have one, but here's the Birdy with a BionX electric package:
http://store.nycewheels.com/birdy-electric-folding-bike.html
My guess is that a dealer could replace anything plastic with something sturdier. Of the two Brompton dealers I have had business with, both are outstanding.
BTW I have not dumped my Brompton (nor any other pedal bicycle) for more than thirty years and some tens of thousands of miles.
Paranoia rules.