These strategies, and the statutory provisions that support them, must be maintained. Indeed, our nation's energy security, and our planet's health, depend on it.
Transportation accounts for a staggering two-thirds of U.S. oil consumption.
According to the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, the average American citizen uses five times as much energy for transportation as the average Japanese and nearly three times as much as the average citizen of western Europe. Moreover, transportation energy use is growing fast, at a rate of about 2.6 percent per year in the 1980s. Average new car fuel economy has been declining since 1987, and miles of passenger travel have been growing over four times faster than the driving-age population. This portends major consequences for American foreign policy. Already, we import nearly half of our annual oil consumption, and the proportion is projected to climb to nearly 60 percent in ten years.