Subscribe to our Newsletter
Get regular stories, tips and solutions from Sustainable America and opt-in to receive roundups of the latest food and fuel news.
Transportation
Range Anxiety? Today's electric cars can cover majority of driving needs
Aug 29th, 2016 | By Jessika E Trancik
Electrifying transportation is one of the most promising ways to significantly cut greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles, but so-called range anxiety – concern about being stranded with an uncharged car battery – remains a barrier to electric vehicle adoption. Is range anxiety justified given current cars and charging infrastructure?
It’s a question my research group and I addressed in a recent study. Specifically, we asked: When looking down on the geographic area of the U.S. from a bird’s-eye view, how many personal vehicles on the road daily could be replaced with a low-cost battery electric vehicle (EV), even if daytime charging isn’t available?
Continue Reading
Transportation
Accelerating to a Fuel-Efficient Future
Apr 7th, 2016 | By Jeremy Kranowitz
There have been two competing car narratives happening recently. A few weeks ago, the New York Times reported on how improvements in overall fuel economy have stalled, not surprisingly since the price of gasoline has dropped to $2 per gallon. But the options for drivers who want to buy electric vehicles are better than ever.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Logan High School Clean Air Poster Contest
Mar 21st, 2016 | By Katy Franklin
Utah is experiencing some of its worst measures of air quality in years due in large part to vehicle idling. In order to reach new drivers with the anti-idling message and get them involved in creating change, Utah State University professors started a popular poster contest program that is educating teens, spreading awareness and teaching real-world marketing skills in the process.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Teen Activist Pushes Town to Go Idle-Free
Jan 7th, 2016 | By Katrina Kazda
For more than half of his life, 17-year-old Alex Scaperotta has been fighting to end unnecessary vehicle idling in his hometown of Wilton, Conn.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Charging Ahead in the Cloud
Dec 16th, 2015 | By Amy Leibrock
We’re charged up about Sustainable America’s latest investment. EV Connect, a 6-year-old company in El Segundo, Calif., is working to streamline the electric vehicle charging ecosystem for both drivers and property managers through a hardware-agnostic, cloud-based software system.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Report: More EVs and Cleaner Grid Can Lower Emissions Significantly by 2050
Oct 22nd, 2015 | By Amy Leibrock
Some studies have found that replacing gasoline vehicles with electric vehicles is like trading one dirty fossil fuel for another if the electricity is coming from a coal-fired power plant. Other studies make a good case for driving electric even in regions dominated by coal.
These studies are helpful if you’re evaluating which car to buy and drive today, but what about in the future? What impact can getting more EVs on the road have as the energy grid gets cleaner? Can EVs make a significant difference in lowering total emissions?
Continue Reading
Transportation
The Future of the Electric Car Battery
Sep 14th, 2015 | By Kyle Napolitano
The electric vehicle is one of the most promising sustainable methods of personal transportation. But what about the batteries used to power EVs? Once they can no longer power a car, it is important that EV batteries are not simply thrown into landfills, but rather recycled or better yet, repurposed.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Building a Better Gas Tank
Aug 12th, 2015 | By Gray Peckham
Introducing our latest investment: Infinite Composites Technologies. This Tulsa-based company has an innovative design to make higher capacity, lighter tanks for alternative fuels, helping to increase efficiency and solve range anxiety.
Continue Reading
Transportation
Are School Buses Ready to Go Electric?
May 29th, 2015 | By Amy Leibrock
We often blog about how businesses with vehicle fleets can be more fuel-efficient. But what about our nation’s largest fleet: school buses. Tasked with carrying 25 million children to school every day, our collective school bus fleet is the largest form of mass transit in the United States. Making the 480,000 buses in operation more fuel-efficient would go a long way to reducing oil usage in our country.
Continue Reading
Transportation
UPS Commits to Renewable Natural Gas
May 7th, 2015 | By Amy Leibrock
Renewable natural gas (RNG) got a boost this week when UPS announced an agreement to supply three of its California fueling stations with the fuel. According to UPS, nearly 400 of its vehicles will begin run on RNG starting this month, making it the shipping industry’s largest user of this alternative fuel.
Continue Reading
Previous Load More...