If not for people’s growing preference for SUVs, the energy consumed by cars and their CO2 emissions could have decreased by more than 30% over the past ten years, according to a recent report from the Global Fuel Economy Initiative.
A new report from the Global Fuel Economy Initiative suggests that if it weren’t for people’s appetite for large cars, the world’s significant negative impact on the climate caused by passenger vehicles could have decreased by more than 30% over the past ten years.
According to the group, sport utility vehicles, or SUVs, currently make up more than half of all new car sales worldwide. Using a more limited definition, the International Energy Agency calculates that they account for almost half.
As these vehicles have grown in size over time, so too have their environmental costs, since carbon dioxide emissions from gas-powered vehicles “are almost directly proportional to fuel use.” The tailpipe is where the carbon that enters at the pump exits.
The International Energy Agency estimates that transportation accounts for about 25% of all greenhouse gas emissions from energy use, with passenger travel contributing significantly to this amount.
However, according to the initiative, a global partnership of cleaner vehicle groups, the negative environmental impact of SUVs could have been reduced by more than one-third between 2010 and 2022 if people had simply kept purchasing cars of the same size.
Electric cars could be one solution to this.
Living in West Sacramento, California, George Parrott, 79, is an avid runner who made the decision to switch to cleaner cars in 2004 when he purchased a Toyota Prius hybrid. Since then, he has owned a number of all-electric vehicles. At the moment, he drives a Tesla Model 3 and a Genesis GV60 electric SUV.
He claimed that “all of this was a combination of broad environmental concerns.”
Parrott and his late partner were also aware that their area is high on the list of polluted cities maintained by the American Lung Association. He declared, “We were going to do everything in our power to minimize our impact on the quality of the air here in the Sacramento area.”
Particularly in the United States, not all consumers have the same perspective on the benefits to the environment and energy consumption. Although EV sales made up 15% of the global auto market in 2018, they only made up 7.3% in the United States.
In the last ten years, sedans, or smaller cars, have lost a lot of ground in the US market. According to car-buying resource Edmunds, in 2012, trucks made up 13.5% of the U.S. auto retail space, SUVs slightly over 30%, and sedans 50% of the space. US sedan sales fell to 21% by 2022, while SUV sales reached 54.5% and truck sales reached 20%.
“People don’t want to be constrained by their car’s space,” stated Eric Frehsée, president of the southeast dealership group Tamaroff Group.
The highway fuel economy of large SUVs like the Nissan Armada, Chevrolet Tahoe, and Toyota Sequoia is 19, 24, and 28, respectively. Still, because SUVs are so much heavier than sedans, even the most energy-efficient SUVs will be less efficient than sedans. Though they only accounted for about 18% of new car sales last year, compact SUVs like the Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4—which have highway mileage ratings of 34 and 35 mpg, respectively—are now leading the U.S. SUV market, which is a sign of progress.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the U.S. Department of Transportation are all working harder to reduce tailpipe emissions and increase fuel efficiency in gas-powered vehicles. SUVs are one initiative that the industry is very concerned about.
Up until recently, buyers looking to lessen the impact of their own transportation had limited options for electric models. Sedans made up the majority of the early electrified vehicle options, especially in the luxury market.
Larger EV models are being introduced by more automakers, but they might need even larger batteries. If an EV is to replace an SUV, the environmental impact must also be considered, according to Loren McDonald, CEO of market research firm EVAdoption. McDonald stated, “Just electrifying doesn’t get us much if we also don’t focus on these vehicles’ weight and efficiency and smaller battery packs.”
In order to reduce the size of batteries and the quantity of essential minerals required to make them, the industry is racing to advance battery technology.
Data from the Global Fuel Economy Initiative will undoubtedly be relevant during next week’s COP28 U.N. climate change negotiations.
