331
© The Author(s) 2016
R. Clift, A. Druckman (eds.), Taking Stock of Industrial Ecology,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20571-7_18
Chapter 18
The Industrial Ecology of the Automobile
Roland Geyer
Abstract For the last 100 years, virtually every automobile was an internal combustion vehicle (ICV) powered by either gasoline or diesel and mostly made from
steel. Even as the ICV was identifi ed as a source of serious environmental impact, it
continued to outcompete others, arguably more environmentally benign, transportation modes. Banning lead from gasoline, requiring catalytic converters, and increasing powertrain effi ciency allowed the ICV to respond to environmental criticism
and continue its dominance over other transportation technologies. Today, well over
one billion ICVs are in use worldwide.
Since the turn of the last century, however, this dominance is beginning to be
contested, not so much from other transportation modes but from alternative automotive designs and fuels, such as biofuels, lightweight materials, and fuel cell,
hybrid, and battery electric powertrains. All of these alternatives are meant to
decrease the environmental impacts of cars, but in all cases there is concern about
trade-offs, unintended consequences, and regrettable substitutions. This chapter discusses history and recent developments of automobiles from an industrial ecology
perspective. Such a perspective is necessary to determine the extent to which the
emerging automotive technologies can genuinely reduce rather than simply shift the
environmental impacts of automobiles.
Keywords Industrial ecology of automobiles • Environmental sustainability of
cars • Biofuels • Advanced powertrains • Lightweight automotive materials
1 Introduction
Since time immemorial people and goods had been transported by horse-drawn carriages. This changed in the late nineteenth century, when self-propelled carriages
started to appear in Europe and the United States. In 1897 the New York Times
predicted that “the mechanical wagon with the awful name automobile […] has
R. Geyer (*)
Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, UCSB ,
3426 Bren Hall , Santa Barbara , CA 93106-5131 , USA
e-mail: geyer@bren.ucsb.edu
© The Author(s) 2016
R. Clift, A. Druckman (eds.), Taking Stock of Industrial Ecology,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20571-7_18
Chapter 18
The Industrial Ecology of the Automobile
Roland Geyer
Abstract For the last 100 years, virtually every automobile was an internal combustion vehicle (ICV) powered by either gasoline or diesel and mostly made from
steel. Even as the ICV was identifi ed as a source of serious environmental impact, it
continued to outcompete others, arguably more environmentally benign, transportation modes. Banning lead from gasoline, requiring catalytic converters, and increasing powertrain effi ciency allowed the ICV to respond to environmental criticism
and continue its dominance over other transportation technologies. Today, well over
one billion ICVs are in use worldwide.
Since the turn of the last century, however, this dominance is beginning to be
contested, not so much from other transportation modes but from alternative automotive designs and fuels, such as biofuels, lightweight materials, and fuel cell,
hybrid, and battery electric powertrains. All of these alternatives are meant to
decrease the environmental impacts of cars, but in all cases there is concern about
trade-offs, unintended consequences, and regrettable substitutions. This chapter discusses history and recent developments of automobiles from an industrial ecology
perspective. Such a perspective is necessary to determine the extent to which the
emerging automotive technologies can genuinely reduce rather than simply shift the
environmental impacts of automobiles.
Keywords Industrial ecology of automobiles • Environmental sustainability of
cars • Biofuels • Advanced powertrains • Lightweight automotive materials
1 Introduction
Since time immemorial people and goods had been transported by horse-drawn carriages. This changed in the late nineteenth century, when self-propelled carriages
started to appear in Europe and the United States. In 1897 the New York Times
predicted that “the mechanical wagon with the awful name automobile […] has
R. Geyer (*)
Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, UCSB ,
3426 Bren Hall , Santa Barbara , CA 93106-5131 , USA
e-mail: geyer@bren.ucsb.edu