| Remarks by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham at the Global Forum on Personal Transportation |
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Remarks by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham at the Global Forum on Personal Transportation November 12, 2002 When the Bush Administration took office almost two years ago, we knew we had to address issues of great importance to the future of our country-and of the world. They were: energy security, energy efficiency, reducing polluting emissions, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The President addressed energy security and efficiency in May of last year with his comprehensive and visionary National Energy Plan to ensure abundant, affordable and environmentally sound energy for the future. Shortly after that, he announced his plan for cutting greenhouse gas intensity by 18 percent over the next 10 years, and for eventually stopping -- and then reversing -- greenhouse gas growth. And earlier this year, he announced his Clear Skies Initiative to cut power plant emissions of the three worst air pollutants - nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide and mercury - by 70 percent by the year 2018 We have been moving ahead on a broad front to implement these policies. The FreedomCAR partnership we announced last January was our major initiative in the transportation sector. The G8 Energy Ministerial Summit held here in Detroit last May was an example of the energy plan's emphasis on enhancing international energy relationships through bilateral and multilateral approaches. This Global Forum on Personal Transportation was a direct outgrowth of the G8 energy summit. When I announced our intention to hold this Forum, I expressed my belief that by meeting to discuss transportation and energy issues, we could move forward in addressing the almost limitless possibilities for reduced energy resource consumption, increased efficiency and environmental benefit that can come from international cooperation on technology and transportation issues. In the six months since the G8 Summit, we have made encouraging progress on the very important issues of energy and personal transportation. For that, we can thank the people of the Department of Energy -- and of the many companies and institutions here in Michigan -- all around the United States -- and around the world, that are working every day to hasten the arrival of more energy-efficient automobiles and, eventually, of a transformed energy-transportation world. And we all understand the reasons why we need to make rapid progress toward that day: ï First, the huge projected increase in the number of automobiles and trucks worldwide in coming decades Growth in the number of automobiles and trucks will occur because increased personal mobility is both a cause and an effect of economic growth and prosperity. Growing economies require their citizens to be mobile, and prospering citizens want the improvements in the quality of life that mobility brings. In the industrialized world, the Department of Energy projects the number of vehicles will double by the year 2050, from roughly 500 million to one billion vehicles. But the rapid growth in numbers in the industrialized world is dwarfed by projections of twelve-fold growth in the developing world - from approximately 200 million vehicles today to two-and-one-half billion in 2050. Taken together, we forecast that there will be approximately 3.5 billion vehicles in the world in 2050, five times more than today. With growth in numbers comes growth in energy consumption, and in the case of transportation today, that means oil. More than 96 percent of the energy used in transportation is derived from petroleum and, according to the Energy Information Administration, global consumption could double in the next 25 to 30 years. Growing demand will intensify problems that we are all too familiar with today, namely the energy security and national security concerns that stem from reliance on a single energy resource that is unevenly distributed throughout the world -- and the drain on economic resources, particularly in developing countries, caused by heavy imports of oil. Moreover, there is the environmental impact that a doubling of petroleum consumption could cause. Fortunately, we have made enormous advances in reducing polluting emissions from automobiles in recent years. In the United States, for example, technological advances have reduced automotive tailpipe emissions by more than 96 percent since 1970, even as the number of highway vehicles has doubled. The president's Clear Skies Initiative will also add greatly to reducing polluting emissions. We must continue our efforts to reduce emissions and extend our successes to developing countries. However, the question of CO2 emissions remains. Fuel consumption in the transportation sector worldwide accounts for 26 percent of all CO2 emissions - more than any other sector -- and most of that comes from road transport - cars and trucks. Mitigating CO2 emissions from automobiles will likely require a change in the energy mix and the introduction of new sources of energy. All of our nations recognize that the transportation sector, by meeting the world's need for energy-efficient transportation, will make an enormous contribution to a clean, healthful environment in years to come. But I don't think that the people in the automobile industry receive sufficient credit or appreciation for the remarkable job they have been doing. You have been given the task of reducing the impact of your products on the environment, while continuing to produce reliable and affordable cars and light trucks that consumers want to buy. Not only have you accomplished that objective, you have surpassed it. You deserve congratulations for developing and applying technology to produce personal transportation that today is cleaner, safer, easier to maintain, more reliable and more comfortable than anything consumers could have imagined 20 or 25 years ago. We want to work with you to advance technology even further, and give you room for your proven genius to find the best ways to apply the technology. By working together in pursuit of common goals, we will serve the general public by giving them what they want -- continually improving automobiles and light trucks that successfully appeal to discerning customers in a competitive market. Many of the nations represented here today are undertaking national and regional initiatives that are producing ideas and lessons from which we can all benefit. I would like now to give you a brief update on what we are doing at the national level in the United States. The Department of energy's flagship initiative in this area is the FreedomCAR Partnership. The benefits of the FreedomCAR collaboration will flow not just to the United States but to the entire global transportation community. As you know, FreedomCAR is a research initiative focused on collaborative, pre-competitive, high-risk research. Its goals are ambitious and achievable. We aim to develop the component technologies necessary to provide a full range of emissions-free, affordable cars and light trucks that will end our personal transportation system's dependence on petroleum without sacrificing people's freedom of mobility or freedom of vehicle choice. The FreedomCAR Partnership addresses the light-duty portion of our transportation R&D portfolio. We must also address energy efficiency in the heavy-duty vehicle sector and later today I will be announcing a new vision for our 21st Century Truck Partnership. We have worked hand-in-hand with our industry and government partners to develop this common vision of safe, secure, and environmentally friendly trucks and buses that use sustainable and self-sufficient energy sources and enhance America's global competitiveness. The 21st Century Truck Partnership will be working to meet the challenges that the trucking industry and the nation will be facing in the years to come. The research undertaken under the FreedomCAR Initiative promises much more than conventional, incremental progress toward our goals. It promises a leap - to fuel cell vehicles running on hydrogen made from clean, renewable sources of energy that could more than double the energy efficiency of today's vehicles while emitting only water. As we work toward that ultimate goal, FreedomCAR will also support the development of nearer-term technologies that significantly reduce petroleum consumption and the environmental impacts of conventional vehicles. The FreedomCAR Partnership Plan, which we recently published - and which can be found on the DOE website -- documents the vision, objectives, national benefits, partnership structure, technical scope and timing of the initiative. Creating the hydrogen fuel cell vehicle of the future presents complex technical challenges. Overcoming them will take an intensive and equally complex effort -- but it will be worth it because the stakes are so high. Let me mention just a few of the challenges we face and how we intend to handle them. Safety is a prerequisite for the creation of a commercially viable fuel cell vehicle, of course, and we have established a technical team to find a safe way to store hydrogen in a fuel cell vehicle. The Hydrogen Storage team is one of seven technical teams we have established to work on the goals we plan to achieve by the year 2010. Other major challenges are distinct from the development of the hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle itself. We must, for example, find a safe, energy-efficient, low-cost way to produce the hydrogen to fuel the vehicle. To tackle this challenge, the Department is exploring options for adding an energy component to the FreedomCAR Partnership. We must also establish a national hydrogen infrastructure, just as we once established the extensive and complex national infrastructure that brings to the corner service station the gasoline and other oil products we need for our cars today. We take our existing infrastructure for granted, and I am confident that we will someday take equally for granted the hydrogen infrastructure that is critical to the success of fuel cell vehicles and to achieving a sustainable personal transportation future. As a first step toward the creation of our revolutionary new infrastructure, I am extremely pleased to announce today the release of the National Hydrogen Energy Roadmap. The National Hydrogen Energy Roadmap is the result of a twelve-month collaborative effort between industry and government to identify the challenges and paths forward to much more than a transportation system based on hydrogen fuel cells. President Bush's National Energy Policy laid out the vision for an economy run on hydrogen -- the most common element in the universe. Hydrogen can fuel much more than cars and light trucks, our area of interest. It can also fuel ships, airplanes and trains. It can be used to generate electricity, for heating, and as a fuel for industrial processes. We envision a future economy in which hydrogen is America's clean energy choice -- flexible, affordable, safe, domestically produced, used in all sectors of the economy, and in all regions of the country. Hydrogen offers the long-term potential for a highly efficient energy system that produces near-zero emissions and is based on domestically available resources. Hydrogen can be produced from fossil, nuclear, and renewable resources, thus encouraging diversity in the nation's energy supplies. It can be produced from abundant fossil fuels such as coal without undesirable CO2 emissions by the use of carbon management approaches such as sequestration. The hydrogen-related R&D programs in the Department, including FreedomCAR, will use the Roadmap to define directions and priorities. Next steps will include the development of detailed research and development plans for hydrogen production, delivery, storage, conversion, and end-use applications. The day of the hydrogen economy, while not imminent, is now within sight. For those of us in the energy and transportation sectors, it is an inspiring sight indeed. It promises the kind of transformation not seen since the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when the world experienced the last energy revolution. People then went from candlelight to gas light to electric light: ï From heating and cooking in an inefficient fireplace or stove to gas and electric furnaces and stoves, and Health improved, daily life became safer, travel became faster and more comfortable, commerce and trade flourished - nearly every aspect of life got better. Now imagine a world running on hydrogen later in this century: ï Environmental pollution will no longer be a concern That is worth working for - and that is why we are here today. We will get to the hydrogen economy eventually if we each go it alone -- but we will get there much faster and with much less wasteful duplication of effort if we work together. Somewhere out there are the combinations of individuals -- inventors, scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs, managers and investors -- that will come together to overcome a thousand challenges and make the key breakthroughs that will bring us a different and better world. We in the U.S. government, along with our governmental partners around the world, will work to promote and support cooperation and collaboration. But, as always, we look to the genius of the private sector - we look to you -- to bring us a better future. We are faced with a mammoth task but I can't think of anything that any group of people can do that will have more lasting benefit for more people than working to create an energy-transportation revolution. I'm sure you agree that the challenge we have set for ourselves will have historic consequences - and that it is a privilege to be among those who have the opportunity to contribute in some way to meeting that challenge. Let me conclude by offering my thanks to the various sponsors of our Forum, particularly the U.S. Council for Automotive Research, which is hosting today's luncheon -- and NextEnergy -- the State of Michigan's forward-looking plan to develop the state into a world alternative-energy leader -- for its support and assistance with local arrangements. But most especially, I want to thank all of you who responded with such enthusiasm to the idea of a Global Forum to promote cooperative efforts to usher in a new transportation future. Clearly, we all want to hasten the day when energy-efficient, easy-to-maintain, pollution-free and competitively priced cars and trucks arrive in showrooms around the world. We are off to a great start. Media Contact: http://www.energy.gov/engine/content.do?PUBLIC_ID=13415&BT_CODE=PR_SPEECHES&TT_CODE=PRESSSPEECH
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