In California, 40 percent of greenhouse gas emissions comes from transportation. Emissions from this sector will make it difficult to meet the state鈥檚 2030 climate goals. There is a myriad of solutions: electric vehicles, public transportation, ride share, e-scooters and more. But people鈥檚 behaviors and habits as well as bad land-use planning make this one of the most difficult sectors to decarbonize. In this episode of , we鈥檒l look at how we can transition to low-carbon transportation.
In this episode:
, Director of 3 Revolutions Future Mobility Program, at 嘿嘿视频
, Sustainable Transportation Energy Pathways Program Director, at 嘿嘿视频
, founding Director of the Institute of Transportation Studies and Member
Episode transcript
Amy Quinton: Hey Kat, do remember last year?
Kat Kerlin: Yeah, life was better then.
Amy Quinton: Well I鈥檓 going to take you back, one day last December, for a moment, in your mind.
Kat Kerlin: OK.
Amy Quinton: It was raining.
Kat Kerlin: Wait, you remember it was raining?
Amy Quinton: Yeah, because back then I usually took the bus to work two or three days a week. I鈥檇 go across the causeway from Sacramento to Davis. It can take anywhere from 30 minutes to ---well once it took two hours. It depends on I-80 traffic. And when it rained, I hated it cause, I don鈥檛 like getting wet.
Kat Kerlin: Yeah, super inconvenient. Princess.
Amy Quinton: Well, I was going to campus to talk to one of our transportation experts about reducing greenhouse gases in our transportation sector. And so I thought well, it would be appropriate to take public transit that day.
Kat Kerlin: So you鈥檙e waiting in the rain for the bus.
Amy Quinton: Well actually, let鈥檚 fast forward. The bus has dropped me off on campus, only I need to get to the other side of campus across the highway. And some days, well you know me, I鈥檓 pretty lazy.
Ok, so I鈥檓 outside the Mondavi Center and I just called an Uber to take me to the other side of campus, West Village, and I鈥檝e been told it鈥檚 going to be $7 to take me 8 minutes away. I鈥檓 waiting on Tony and he鈥檚 in a Prius.
Kat Kerlin: Wait, wait, wait鈥.you took an Uber? You could have just hopped on Unitrans, the university鈥檚 bus system.
Amy Quinton: Shhh, don鈥檛 interrupt, I鈥檓 telling a story. So Tony shows up. Hi, are you Tony?
Tony: I sure am. You鈥檙e Amy, right?
Amy Quinton: Yes.
Tony: Tilla street, huh?
Amy Quinton: Yeah, not very far at all. So I strike up a conversation and tell him about this podcast episode. One of the things I鈥檓 looking at is reducing greenhouse gas emissions so I鈥檓 pleased you picked me up in a Prius.
Tony: That鈥檚 cool. Well, believe me I would drive an electric car if I could afford one that had the range.
Amy Quinton: Five minutes later.
Tony: Mam鈥 you have a nice day, ok?
Amy Quinton: Thank you really appreciate it.
Tony: Take care.
Kat Kerlin: OK, what was the point of that little scene?
Amy Quinton: Oh, I just wanted to reminisce. We鈥檙e not taking Uber as much during the pandemic and I wanted people to just remember what it was like.
Kat Kerlin: No really, Amy, what was the point?
Amy Quinton: Well I thought it was a great example of all the excuses we have for not doing the right thing when it comes to reducing our transportation carbon footprint.
Kat Kerlin: But you didn鈥檛 take a car at first. You took a bus. That was a good start.
Amy Quinton: Yeah, well public transit is always better. But then again, I only take it a few days a week or I did before the pandemic which now has me working out of a closet. And I hardly ever take it if it鈥檚 raining.
Kat Kerlin: Well using Uber isn鈥檛 that bad though. And he was driving a Prius.
Amy Quinton: A hybrid is good. But it鈥檚 not electric and well, Tony the driver thinks electric cars don鈥檛 have the range. And I found out that using ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft may lead to an increase in the amount of vehicle miles traveled, especially if you鈥檙e using the service instead of taking public transit like I was.
Kat Kerlin: Or if the drivers aren鈥檛 in a hybrid or electric car. Well, it sounds like there鈥檚 going to be a lot to unfold about transportation.
Amy Quinton: It鈥檚 a moving target.
Kat Kerlin: Your puns are just ridiculous, Amy.
Amy Quinton: Yeah, but it is a moving target, the pandemic has completely changed some of our transportation habits. And it keeps changing.
Kat Kerlin: You鈥檙e right, and we鈥檒l be talking about that as well. Now let鈥檚 move on鈥
THEME Climate models all agree that temperatures are going to increase. It's going to be hotter. It's going to be drier. Fires are going to burn more frequently. Maybe this is never gonna be the way it was again. We need to come up with ways to literally pull CO2 out of the atmosphere. How are we going to work together to solve a challenge like climate change?
Amy Quinton: Coming to you from our closet studios as we shelter in place across the Sacramento region, this is Unfold, a 嘿嘿视频 podcast that breaks down complicated problems and discusses solutions. This week we unfold 鈥渢ransitioning to low-carbon transportation.鈥 I鈥檓 Amy Quinton.
Kat Kerlin: And I鈥檓 Kat Kerlin. Speaking of carbon, how carbon-intensive is transportation you might ask? Well it plays a huge role in our greenhouse gas emissions. It accounts for 40 percent of California鈥檚 emissions, about a third of US emissions and about 14 percent globally.
Amy Quinton: In this episode, we鈥檙e going to be talking about solutions to our transportation emission problems, but we also need to get real. The main problem is us and our habits. I mean, who doesn鈥檛 love getting in their comfy car in the morning. You put your travel mug right in the little cup holder. You start the engine. And, if you鈥檙e like me you put on your favorite radio station. And you hit the road. Giovanni Circella with our Institute of Transportation Studies researches travel behavior. He鈥檚 the one I went to see that rainy day, last December.
Giovanni Circella: Americans love cars. A lot of people love cars, especially when they need to carry something with them or the weather is not very nice like today in Davis it鈥檚 raining so a lot of people are using their cars instead of riding bicycles and this is something we need to deal with.
Kat Kerlin: See Amy, you鈥檙e not the only one who doesn鈥檛 like to get wet.
Amy Quinton: Yeah, but I need to stop making excuses. Of course, I can鈥檛 bike to work because I live so far away. I also don鈥檛 own a bike, but that鈥檚 not the point. The point is, according to Giovanni, our cities are also really designed for our love of cars.
Giovanni Circella: Cities have been designed in the way that people travel by car to most places. We have residential neighborhoods that were built. And then we had commercial malls that were built in other areas. And then we have offices in central core of cities and in industrial areas.
Amy Quinton: Giovanni told me that it was rational to design cities this way when you think about building our utility infrastructure, separating residential from industrial uses makes sense. But鈥
Giovanni Circella: But when it comes to transportation, it鈥檚 a disaster because it makes all trips longer, it makes many trips not possible to be made with non-car modes and increases the car dependence of society.
Kat Kerlin: Ok, well, we can鈥檛 rebuild cities 鈥 at least not easily.
Amy Quinton: No, so perhaps we should just make our cars more efficient. Well, we鈥檝e been doing that.
Giovanni Circella: Sure, cars are more efficient than they were 10 or 15 years ago but still today we have more miles traveled so the total number of miles is going up and we have more greenhouse gas emissions from transportation. So, we are not on track to achieve the transportation goals that we set.
Kat Kerlin: By goals, I鈥檓 assuming he鈥檚 talking about California鈥檚 climate change goals which aim to reduce greenhouse gases 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050.
Amy Quinton: Yeah, and one way to get us there is to get more electric vehicles on the road. In fact, our experts say adoption of zero emission vehicles is by far the single most important strategy for reducing carbon emissions from transportation. And by the way, Governor Newsom recently issued an executive order mandating that all new passenger cars sold be zero emission by 2035.
Kat Kerlin: Right, and that鈥檚 going to be a heavy lift, given how few people are buying zero emission vehicles now. Lew Fulton is with our Institute of Transportation Studies.
Lew Fulton: Right now we鈥檙e selling at around 8 percent of sales in California, maybe it鈥檚 close to 10 percent now, that are electric or hydrogen, zero-emission. By and large those are mostly electric vehicles.
Amy Quinton: So Kat, do you own an electric car?
Kat Kerlin: Sadly, no. We鈥檙e waiting until our Subaru is on its last wheels.
Amy Quinton: I don鈥檛 either. In fact, I bought a car just last year and the thought of buying an electric car just seemed overwhelming. I think I just assumed they鈥檙e really expensive and require charging stations. So instead I just bought a really reliable, fairly inexpensive used one. Apparently, I鈥檓 like most consumers.
Dan Sperling: When it comes to buying something big and expensive, people are conservative. With cars and houses, the two largest purchases that people make, they tend to be much more conservative.
Kat Kerlin: That鈥檚 Dan Sperling, director of the Institute of Transportation Studies or I-T-S.
Amy Quinton: He says not only are people simply conservative when they buy cars, when it comes to electric cars, people 鈥 just like that Uber driver 鈥 have an additional anxiety.
Dan Sperling: There is this range anxiety that exists. The reality is with most of the electric, new electric cars they have quite a bit of range. They range from about 150 to about 350 miles on a charge. So it鈥檚 not as much as gasoline, but it鈥檚 not like you have to charge it every half hour to get somewhere.
Kat Kerlin: Ok Amy, so say you鈥檙e going on a long trip, you would have to charge the car. And in most states, there aren鈥檛 enough public charging stations. I think our experts would agree that there need to be more charging stations.
Amy Quinton: Yeah. It鈥檚 happening. It does need to happen faster. But the technologies around these cars are changing fast 鈥 including longer ranges. Lew Fulton says people are just unaware.
Lew Fulton: I think when people drive electric cars, they are pretty convinced wow, they鈥檙e great. They perform really well. But a lot of people have never been behind the wheel of an electric car, so they don鈥檛 know that. And incidently, automakers still do not spend much money to advertise these vehicles. They鈥檙e producing them. They鈥檙e not really marketing them very aggressively. So that has to change.
Amy Quinton: So Kat, I鈥檓 one of those consumers who had never been behind the wheel of an electric car or even been a passenger in one.
Kat Kerlin: You were an environment reporter in California. How is that possible?
Amy Quinton: I know, I know. Well, I told Giovanni Circella that. And after our interview, I had him drive me back to Sacramento in an electric car.
Kat Kerlin: Nice. In the name of journalistic research, naturally.
Amy Quinton: Well, of course. I mean, it was also rush hour. It was 5 o鈥檆lock. And let鈥檚 face it, if I were going to take the bus back to where I could jump on the shuttle bus back to Sacramento, I would miss the shuttle by about 15 minutes. Then I would have to wait until 6 o鈥檆lock and I just wanted to get home.
Kat Kerlin: You are full of excuses.
Amy Quinton: Like most people.
Kat Kerlin: True.
Amy Quinton: Oh yeah, and it was raining, which I was complaining about, of course, before we even got to the electric car.
Giovanni Circella: It could rain.
Amy Quinton: I know, oh my God, if it never dropped any precipitation, I would love it.
Giovanni Circella: Ok
Amy Quinton: Oh, look at this. Alright, research in motion.
Giovanni Circella: Yes.
Amy Quinton: Do you know about this car? Can you talk about it a little bit?
Giovanni Circella: Sure. We can do it. Ok.
Amy Quinton: What kind of car is this? A BMW?
Giovanni Circella: This is a BMW I-3.
Amy Quinton: That tiny sound was the motor starting. It鈥檚 so quiet.
Giovanni Circella: It is nice to be in an electric vehicle. It鈥檚 very quiet. We can start driving and we almost don鈥檛 realize that we are really going. The car is on, and we鈥檙e starting to drive鈥
Amy Quinton: As we begin our approximately 16-mile journey. We merge onto I-80 and traffic almost immediately brings us to a crawl.
Giovanni Circella: It鈥檚 stop and go. We are actually breaking very often sometimes even stopping in the middle of the freeway. It鈥檚 very far away from the idea of free flow for which many times we built our interstate system.
Amy Quinton: This was an interesting point. Giovanni says engineers were taught to add more lanes when traffic was not flowing freely.
Giovanni Circella: It doesn鈥檛 work. The more capacity we put on the roadway the more people will travel by car.
Amy Quinton: And the more cars on the road, the longer people sit in traffic, the more greenhouse gases. It鈥檚 a vicious cycle. By 5:26, we鈥檙e still not in Sacramento. We鈥檙e not even in West Sacramento.
Giovanni Circella: The I-80 is a major corridor. The thing that is kind of concerning is that every year it is getting worse.
Amy Quinton: No doubt 鈥 but it makes me feel a little better that we are in an electric car.
Giovanni Circella: The car is telling us right now that we have 67 miles of range remaining. So we pretty much can go for 67 miles without charging, which makes enough for short trips like the one we鈥檙e doing. Now of course you know, batteries get depleted. We also have newer cars that actually have better range. But the range is becoming less and less of a concern for most trips.
Amy Quinton: I had no range anxiety. In all honesty, I had looked up where charging stations were near me, and they鈥檙e all over the place. We finally arrive at my doorstep.
Ok, so 5:48 so about 45-minute trip for 16 miles.
Giovanni Circella: Not too bad during peak time. I mean, by Amtrak it would have taken only 20 minutes to go from Davis to Sacramento鈥
Amy Quinton: Ok, so I should point out that Giovanni 鈥 probably like most Europeans 鈥 raved about rail systems. But he also says it鈥檚 not the total solution for obvious reasons.
Giovanni Circella: But it would have been downtown Davis to downtown Sacramento. And it would have taken a lot more time to go from ITS-Davis where we were to the station in Davis. And then from the station in Sacramento, how do you come here?
Amy Quinton: Yeah.
Giovanni Circella: So we would have probably had to take an Uber or鈥
Amy Quinton: And so that鈥檚 what you think about all the time, from end to end?
Giovanni Circella: Exactly. And that really is what is the biggest difficulty today to change transportation in the U.S. And this is really what we need to think more and more if you want to achieve the climate goals of California because it鈥檚 not just electrification that will take us there.
Amy Quinton: Kat, Giovanni thinks about travel from doorstep to destination, end to end. And he says this is where newer technologies like micro-mobility services, those dockless bikes and e-scooters, can help. They can eliminate the need to take a car for short trips, say from rail service to my doorstep.
Kat Kerlin: So micro-mobility will help, electric vehicles will help. So let鈥檚 talk about why Giovanni says electrification alone will not allow us to meet our climate goals. Didn鈥檛 we say it鈥檚 the most important strategy?
Amy Quinton: We did. But electric vehicles still require road infrastructure and still need energy to run. And there鈥檚 also the issue of battery waste. And like other cars, they also occupy a lot of space. Did you know? Did you know that a third of the land area of LA is used for parking?
Kat Kerlin: Yikes. OK, so what else do we need to do?
Amy Quinton: I asked Dan Sperling that.
Dan Sperling: The second big strategy and it鈥檚 a much more difficult one, is to reduce vehicle use.
Amy Quinton: Not easy. But he says the way to do that is to pool or share rides.
Kat Kerlin: By that, he does not mean carpool, right?
Amy Quinton: Right, Dan says we鈥檝e spent billions on carpool lanes and the number of people that carpool has actually dropped in the last couple of decades. Instead, Dan says the next big step is shared automation.
Dan Sperling: We need to convert our cars to be automated, our vehicles, and for them to be provided as part of a mobility service where many people would be riding those vehicles and they would give up car ownership.
Amy Quinton: In many ways, the idea is like Uber Pool or Lyft share 鈥 only driverless. Being driverless saves money, so more people can use it, and it makes it way more adoptable for cities.
Kat Kerlin: A study Lew Fulton did a few years ago showed by 50 percent or more in 2050 if adopted worldwide but, and it鈥檚 a big but, they have to be both electric and shared. You can find that on our Science & Climate website at climatechange.ucdavis.edu.
Amy Quinton: Yeah, and Dan says shared automation is the perfect marriage of mass transit and the comfort of our cars.
Dan Sperling: They鈥檒l be a computer that organizes the routing and it will just pick up people on your route as you go and it will adjust it automatically. So the net effect is that you have a transportation system that is cheaper, less vehicle use and therefore less greenhouse gases. It requires less road space, less parking, better for equity. So this is really very compelling.
Kat Kerlin: So 嘿嘿视频 researchers launched this a few years ago. The main idea being the greatest environmental and public benefit would come from three things: driverless, electric and shared mobility.
Amy Quinton: It may sound really futuristic. You know, like the Jetsons cartoon?
Dan Sperling: This is not the Jetsons, this is not pie-in-the-sky this will happen. There鈥檚 a big question, how fast it鈥檒l happen and exactly where, but the reality is there is a future that鈥檚 a far more sustainable transportation future than what we have now. We鈥檝e mostly failed in transportation. We have a transportation system that鈥檚 hugely expensive, huge environmental cost and very inequitable.
Amy Quinton: Kat, since Dan brought up the Jetsons鈥 did ask him a bit more about what travel could be like in the future.
Dan Sperling: There are some more exotic things there鈥檚 like electric planes that people are developing for relatively short distances, like 50 to 100 miles so you can hop over all that traffic congestions.
Amy Quinton: What? Really?
Dan Sperling: Yeah, there鈥檚 billions of dollars going into that right now and eventually they鈥檒l be automated as well. So they鈥檒l be small planes with a few people in them that will fly 50 to 100 miles.
Amy Quinton: That sounds like the Jetsons, I鈥檓 sorry, but it does.
Dan Sperling: It does evoke Jetsons. But I鈥檝e given talks at conferences where it just filled up with the engineers and the companies that are doing this.
Amy Quinton: Believe it or not Kat, this idea is really taking off.
Kat Kerlin: Ugh. There you go again with the puns. Oh my. So back to the 3 Revolutions. We鈥檝e got ride sharing, electrification and automation. What is the biggest hurdle to making this low carbon transportation future happen?
Dan Sperling: The hold up or the challenge is: Will people give up car ownership and will they share rides?
Kat Kerlin: And right now, sharing rides is not happening, thanks to a pandemic.
Amy Quinton: I鈥檒l sum it up this way: it鈥檚 a disaster.
Kat Kerlin: There鈥檚 a negative word.
Amy Quinton: Well, you know me. But 鈥渄isaster鈥 is a word our experts used to talk about transportation changes during this pandemic. Ride-hailing, ride share, micro-mobility, and most especially mass transit have seen huge reductions in use.
Kat Kerlin: Yeah, people are using their cars for safety reasons. In fact, Giovanni Circella is currently researching people鈥檚 transportation habits during COVID, and he鈥檚 found a third of people are using their cars more than they used to and 58 percent remain hesitant to use shared mobility.
Amy Quinton: Probably not surprising, since we saw drive-through graduations and going away parties, drive-through weddings, rock concerts and the return of drive-in movies. When I spoke to Giovanni again this summer, he said micro-mobility use plummeted. People were afraid to touch handlebars of bikes or scooters.
Giovanni Circella: At the same time, micro-mobility is actually experiencing a big, big reduction in use the last few months. Some cities are actually completely banning micro mobility for safety reasons and for social distancing. They鈥檙e actually removing all scooters and they actual putting a ban on their use.
Amy Quinton: Those bans have since been lifted, but not without micro-mobility companies taking a huge economic hit. Uber, the parent company of Jump bikes, merged their e-scooter business with Lime bikes as a way to stay alive. But that鈥檚 not necessarily a good thing.
Giovanni Circella: This process could continue because many other micro-mobility companies are struggling right now and we could see actually more mergers and acquisitions, which might lead to less competition, less availability of scooters, potentially higher fares and this might actually have an impact in demand.
Amy Quinton: Uber Pool stopped service, at least temporarily. Both Uber and Lyft have seen ridership drop dramatically.
Kat Kerlin: But nothing has been hit harder than mass transit. When COVID-19 first hit, public transit in San Francisco and New York saw a 90 percent decline in ridership 鈥 90 percent! Here in Sacramento, Sac RT has seen ridership drop 70 percent, although there has been an uptick since then.
Amy Quinton: And that鈥檚 particularly concerning because in lots of cities, transit was already in trouble. Dan Sperling says those services rely on government funding and subsidies.
Dan Sperling: The government doesn鈥檛 have a lot of money right now. Tax revenues are down and costs are way up. So there has to be a reckoning. I think some of the smaller transit operators. They鈥檙e probably going to disappear.
Kat Kerlin: That is not good. So could this all return to normal once the pandemic ends?
Amy Quinton: Well that鈥檚 a good question. And it鈥檚 something Giovanni is researching.
Giovanni Circella: Certainly the pandemic poses a question about even if we go back to normality, what the future of transportation will look like. This has been a question already for many people that rely on public transportation because they don鈥檛 have other ways to move around. And so some are actually reported to be buying a car.
Amy Quinton: Yep, more cars on the road.
Kat Kerlin: At least for those that can afford to buy one. There is a huge equity component to all of this. The drop off in transit use is going to affect the lower income and disadvantaged people the most.
Amy Quinton: Just like with so many aspects of climate change. But maybe the pandemic will make companies more open to the idea of telecommuting. And maybe video conferencing with your doctor won鈥檛 be such a weird thing anymore. And Dan believes ride sharing will pick up again 鈥 it鈥檚 just a matter of when.
Kat Kerlin: You can learn more about our transportation research on our Science and Climate website, climatechange.ucdavis.edu.
Amy Quinton: And listen to more episodes of Unfold at ucdavis.edu/Unfold. I鈥檓 Amy Quinton.
Kat Kerlin: And I鈥檓 Kat Kerlin. Thanks for listening.
Credits: Unfold is a production of 嘿嘿视频. It's produced by Cody Drabble. Original music for Unfold comes from 嘿嘿视频 alumnus Damian Verrett and Curtis Jerome Haynes.