[E&E seminars] Seminar-Toward Two Billion Cars: Transforming Vehicles, Fuels, & Mobility (3/5/09)

[Karen Gibson]

JOINT MIT Energy Initiative -Transportation Program Talk

TOWARD TWO BILLION CARS:  TRANSFORMING VEHICLES, FUELS, AND MOBILITY
Professor Daniel Sperling
University of California, Davis

  March 5th, 10:30 AM - 11:30 AM
Stata Center, Room 32-D463

The world is headed toward two billion vehicles. Is this sustainable?  
Not without transforming vehicles, fuels, and transportation generally— 
not only in the U.S., but virtually everywhere. Professor Sperling  
will examine the roots of the problem: the resistant auto industry,  
dysfunctional oil markets, shortsighted government policies, and  
unmotivated consumers. He will examine alternative fuel failures and  
successes, shrinking price elasticity of demand for gasoline, the  
evolving transportation monoculture, the advent of hybrids and other  
advanced technologies, and recent shifts in vehicle mix – within the  
context of California and US public policy. He will focus on the role  
of innovation and policy in bringing about low carbon fuels, electric- 
drive vehicles, socially-responsible behavior, enhanced mobility  
services, and low-carbon cities.

  Daniel Sperling is Professor of Civil Engineering and Environmental  
Science and Policy, founding Director of the Institute of  
Transportation Studies, and interim Director of the EneRgy Efficiency  
Center at the University of California, Davis (ITS-Davis). In February  
2007, Governor Schwarzenegger appointed Dr. Sperling to the  
“automotive” seat on the California Air Resources Board. He is author  
or editor of 200 papers and reports and 11 books (including Two  
Billion Cars, Oxford University Press), has served on 11 National  
Academies committees, was selected as a National Associate of the  
National Academies, and chairs the Future of Mobility council of the  
Davos World Economic Forum.  He has recently appeared on the Jon  
Stewart Daily Show and NPR’s Fresh Air and Science Friday. Professor  
Sperling earned his Ph.D. in Transportation Engineering from the  
University of California, Berkeley (with minors in Economics and  
Energy & Resources) and his B.S. in Environmental Engineering and  
Urban Planning from Cornell University. He Professor Sperling worked  
two years as an environmental planner for the US Environmental  
Protection Agency and two years as an urban planner in the Peace Corps  
in Honduras.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.mit.edu/pipermail/environmental-seminars/attachments/20090220/df59dd64/attachment.htm