It has long been realized that improving energy efficiency releases an economic reaction that partially offsets the original energy saving. As the energy efficiency of some process improves, the process becomes cheaper, thereby providing an incentive to increase its use. Thus total energy consumption changes less than proportionally to changes in physical energy efficiency. For motor vehicles, the process under consideration is use of fuel in producing vehicle-miles traveled (VMT). Our empirical specification is based on a simple aggregate model that simultaneously determines VMT, vehicles, and fuel efficiency. The coefficient on the lagged dependent variable implies considerable inertia in behavior, with people adjusting their travel in a given year by just 21 percent of the ultimate response to a permanent change. The equation exhibits only mild autocorrelation, giving people confidence that their specification accounts for most influences that move sluggishly over time.

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Fuel efficiency and motor vehicle travel: the declining rebound effect

Professor Ross Garnaut was commissioned by all of the Governments of Australia's Federation to examine the impacts of climate change on Australia and to recommend policy frameworks to improve the prospects of sustainable prosperity. The Garnaut Climate Change Review is one of the most important reports to be published in Australia for many years. It examines the impacts of climate change on the Australian economy, the costs of adaptation and mitigation, and the international context in which climate change is experienced and negotiated. It analyses the elements of an appropriate international policy response, and the challenges that face Australia in playing its proportionate part in that response. The Garnaut Climate Change Review is highly relevant to the global problem that is climate change. It considers what policies the international community should adopt in responding to climate change, and urges humanity to act now, and in concert, to develop the required policy response in time.

The Garnaut Climate Change Review

This paper discusses the nature, and magnitude, of externalities associated with automobile use, including local and global pollution, oil dependence, traffic congestion and traffic accidents. It then discusses current federal policies affecting these externalities, including fuel taxes, fuel-economy and emissions standards, and alternative fuel policies, summarizing, insofar as possible, the welfare effects of those policies. Finally, we discuss emerging pricing policies, including congestion tolls, and insurance reform, and we summarize what appears to be the appropriate combination of policies to address automobile externalities.

Automobile Externalities and Policies

This paper is one of two companion papers which survey price elasticities of transport demand. In addition to reviewing empirical elasticity estimates for both freight and passenger demand, this paper also deals with theoretical and empirical issues in estimating transport demand elasticities. The second survey, by Dr. Philip Goodwin, is primarily concerned with empirical estimates of demand elasticities of public traansit system and automobile usage. The origins of motivations of these two papers were different. As was the coverage and sources used. The two papers complemented each other and are therefore published together with a pooled bibliography.

Concepts of price elasticities of transport demand and recent empirical estimates: an interpretative survey. in: urban transport

The guide, produced by a consortium comprising TRL and partners from academia and the commercial transport industry, on behalf of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) describes how various factors influence the demand for public transport. The new guide updates the 1980 TRL publication ?The Demand for Public Transport? and should provide a vital reference source to key stakeholders, such as public transport operators and central and local government. In 1980 the then Transport and Road Research Laboratory, now TRL, published the original international collaborative report which for over twenty years has been the seminal piece of work on demand evaluation in setting out the factors affecting public transport patronage at the time. However the values of many of the parameters under consideration have changed, new methodologies and concepts have emerged and the institutional, socio-economic, environmental and legal framework is substantially different. In reviewing the publication, TRL worked with science based partners, the Transport Studies Unit - University of Oxford ; Institute for Transport Studies - University of Leeds ; Transport Studies Group - University of Westminster and the Centre for Transport Studies - University College London. Industrial based support came from The Association of Train Operating Companies, the Confederation of Passenger Transport, the Rees Jeffreys Road Fund, the Greater Manchester Public Transport Executive and public transport operators. Analysis and research by using primary and secondary data sources on the factors influencing the demand for public transport was pursued to produce a document that assists in identifying cost-effective schemes for improving services. The project involved the identification of data sources and initial analysis of overall trends in the bus and rail industries in Britain , and the analysis of the effects of fares, service quality, incomes, car ownership, land use, population, employment and wider transport policies on public transport demand.

The demand for public transport: a practical guide

Elasticities of Road Traffic and Fuel Consumption with Respect to Price and Income: A Review

This paper has two objectives: to examine the volatility of travel behavior over time and consider the factors explaining this volatility; and to estimate the factors determining car ownership and commuting by car. The analysis is based on observations of individuals and households over a period of up to eleven years obtained from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). Changes in car ownership, commuting mode and commuting time over a period of years for the same individuals/households are examined to determine the extent to which these change from year to year. This volatility of individual behavior is a measure of the ease of change or adaptation. If behavior changes easily, policy measures are likely to have a stronger and more rapid effect than if there is more resistance to change. The changes are “explained” in terms of factors such as moving house, changing job and employment status. The factors determining car ownership and commuting by car are analyzed using a dynamic panel-data model.

Volatility of Car Ownership, Commuting Mode and Time in the UK

This paper has two objectives: to examine the volatility of travel behaviour over time and consider the factors explaining this volatility; and to estimate the factors determining car ownership and commuting by car. The analysis is based on observations of individuals and households over a period of up to 11 years obtained from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). Changes in car ownership, commuting mode and commuting time over a period of years for the same individuals/households are examined to determine the extent to which these change from year-to-year. This volatility of individual behaviour is a measure of the ease of change or adaptation. If behaviour changes easily, policy measures are likely to have a stronger and more rapid effect than if there is more resistance to change. The changes are “explained” in terms of factors such as moving house, changing job and employment status. The factors determining car ownership and commuting by car are analysed using a dynamic panel-data models.

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Volatility of car ownership, commuting mode and time in the UK

This paper examines the demand for local bus services in England. The study is based on a
dynamic model relating per capita bus patronage to bus fares, income, and service level,
and is estimated using a combination of time-series and cross-section data for English
counties. The results indicate that patronage is relatively fare-sensitive, with a wide
variation in the elasticities.

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The demand for local bus services in England

The analysis of the factors determining changes in travel behavior on the individual (or individual household) level requires information on the behavior of individuals over time. Such "transport" panel surveys are rarely available, particularly for a sufficiently long time period to examine such changes more than cursorily. For the United Kingdom, none exists for other than limited regions. However, the ongoing British Household Panel Survey (BHPS), begun in 1991, provides some information related to transport—specifically, household car ownership—as well as information on the economic and sociodemographic characteristics of the households surveyed. BHPS data for 1993 to 1966 are used to analyze car ownership and the factors determining car ownership decisions on an individual household level. As far as is known, this has not yet been done in any systematic manner. The relationship between car ownership, income, and sociodemographic factors such as household composition, residential location, and populat...

Mark Hanly

Papers

Elasticities of Road Traffic and Fuel Consumption with Respect to Price and Income: A Review

Volatility of Car Ownership, Commuting Mode and Time in the UK

Volatility of car ownership, commuting mode and time in the UK

The demand for local bus services in England

Car Ownership in Great Britain: Panel Data Analysis