To address climate change, we must reduce emissions from transportation. Unfortunately, electric cars are not the panacea that many people believe them to be. If all vehicles in the United States were electric, the amount of electricity needed to support American driving habits would completely overwhelm our electrical grid, which is also not yet fully carbon neutral. To reduce transportation emissions in the U.S., we must address suburban sprawl, which causes far too many Americans to unnecessarily rely on cars. Incorporating smart growth policies like mixed-use, transit oriented communities can bring us much closer to our emissions reduction goals.
