Debate Settled: Flying Is Way More Efficient Than Driving

Last year when I moved from New York to San Francisco and joined WIRED, my new boss yelled at me instead of enjoying a magnificent expedition. ("Do you drive on off road?" He begged, "Please tell us that you are driving off-road." I reserved a flight because I did not have a car. In the United States, the energy required to travel by car is more than twice the energy required to fly.

This is based on research by Michael Sivak of the University of Michigan Transportation Laboratory. These figures are based on the number of BTU (British thermal unit, equivalent to 1,055 joules) required for one person to travel one mile. In 1970, the flight energy doubled, but this situation was reversed. In 2012, 4,211 BTUs were driven one mile per person in the past year, but only 2,033 cars were needed for flight.

Mileage data is based on average fuel consumption of all minicars (ie passenger cars, SUVs, pickups and vans) using data from US DOT. Sivak counts only vehicles equipped with internal combustion engines. Plug-in hybrid cars and electric cars are not used. It accounts for less than 1% of US vehicles. These flight numbers include major large domestic and large regional airlines adjusted for cargo and passenger mails.

The efficiency of automobiles has been increasing more and more in recent years, but the aviation industry has made major progress in reducing fuel usage. According to data from international civil aviation organizations, in 1985 passengers needed more than 2 gallons of fuel to travel 60 miles. This number is now under 3 gallons. This is because airlines are obsessed with reducing the use of expensive jet fuel. They use better engines to operate the newer engines and take advantage of every opportunity to gain more miles from the plane (regardless of how tragic it is)

If you are dissatisfied with driving while flying, there is good news: any car of 44.7 miles or more per gallon will exceed the aircraft. Recently, this has opened up several options. Of course there are hybrids of all electricity and plug-ins, as well as hybrid versions of Toyota Prius and Volkswagen Jetta and Honda Accord and Civic.

There is another way to match flight efficiency on the ground: passengers. Based on the DOT data, Sivak calculated his number based on 38 vehicle load per vehicle. In the early version of this investigation announced last year based on 2010 data, he found that by increasing the number of cars to three, it is as efficient as a car. Sivak did not calculate up-to-date data, but stated that the three are not enough, as the aircraft has become more efficient over the past few years

Driving from New York to Los Angeles with SUV or even medium-sized cars is a bad thing for the planet than flying there. This is because the fuel efficiency of automobiles has not only increased at a much slower rate than that of aircraft, but also because Americans are increasingly inclined to drive alone. Higher degrees. As a result, cars are the biggest threat to the climate and all costs of global warming are caused by increasingly stormy storms, droughts, sea level rise, and food supply pressure to infrastructure, housing and living. If the price of gasoline and the car that burns it actually reflects the real cost and damage they cause, ordinary cars will be extinct. The cost of gasoline exceeds ten dollars per gallon. This is the size of a secret subsidy.

The concept of unmanned vehicles is becoming increasingly popular as a way to combat climate change, as these automated vehicles drive more efficiently than most people. They avoid rapid acceleration and braking, two habits of wasting fuel. In addition, you can close the fleet of automated driving vehicles on the highway to reduce drag and save fuel. Unmanned vehicles promote car sharing, reduce the number of vehicles on the road, may not require a private car. This survey shows that cars can be programmed to simulate the ethical behavior of humans involved in choice and to decide which of the multiple collisions with potential for collision is the best choice. Scientists place human subjects in immersive virtual reality environments to study behavior in simulated traffic scenarios. Then, they use the data to design algorithms for unattended driving vehicles. It allows them to deal with the potentially tragic dilemma on the road, as if it were human