Commuters' nightmare
With gas prices ever on the rise, people living farther from the workplace, and traffic conditions worsening by the week, the daily commute is increasingly having an impact on our wallets and our lifestyles -- as well as global climate change. From getting the best gas mileage to work-from-home jobs to reducing air travel and international travel (by holding teleconferences, for example), improving your commute means improving your quality of life.
Since 1960, the number of miles Americans travel each year has more than tripled. Meanwhile, fuel economy of passenger vehicles has decreased. Between 1993 and 2003, greenhouse gas emissions from transportation went up nearly 25 percent, according to a report by the US EPA. And despite the fact that nobody likes sitting in traffic, we are increasingly driving to work alone in our cars, all the while contributing to global warming and making ourselves miserable.
In fact, light-duty vehicles -- that's passenger cars, vans, minivans, SUVs, and pickup trucks -- account for 62 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., says the EPA. Passenger cars alone are responsible for 35 percent of that, and are the largest contributor of any vehicle category, above even heavy-duty vehicles and aircraft. Consider now that for each gallon of gas a car burns, it emits about 20 pounds of carbon dioxide. Multiply that by a daily commute of 40 miles for a car that gets 24 miles per gallon, and you have a car that's spewing out more than 8,000 pounds of CO2 for its commute each year. Saving just a few gallons of gas each week can really add up.
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