One day petrol will run dry

IF you had to drive to work today, you will be all to aware of the price of petrol. Thanks to the latest rises in the cost of crude oil, unleaded is nudging 90p a litre in York - and is even higher in rural areas. The dreaded figure of £1 a litre is hovering on the horizon.

This may only be a temporary peak caused by the tense situation in Saudi Arabia. Forecourt prices may even fall back a little if the international situation stabilises.

But don't bet on it. And don't kid yourself - in the long term, matters are going to get a lot worse.

We no longer live in an oil-rich world, says Prof John Whitelegg of the Stockholm Environment Institute at York University.

Experts reckon that of the world's estimated resource of about two trillion barrels of recoverable oil, something like half is now gone (see panel). And yet our global demand for oil continues to increase, day by day.

At the moment, Prof Whitelegg says, there are about 750 million cars in the world. But China, the world's biggest country, is waking up to the potential of the car. About 1,000 extra cars every day are taking to the roads of that country alone. India, the world's second biggest country, won't be far behind. The result? If things go on as they are, there will be an estimated 2.5 billion cars in the world by 2030 - more than three times as many as today.

We cannot carry on as we are, in other words. We are going to have to change the way we live and the way we get around to reduce our consumption of oil.

There are all sorts of possible ways forward. We could try to make our cars more fuel efficient, so they go further on less petrol. We could switch them to other forms of fuel - hydrogen, for example, or 'biodiesel' made perhaps from Yorkshire oil seed rape.

Local authorities could introduce punitive parking or congestion charges to discourage car use, and couple this with improved public transport - monorails running into the heart of York, perhaps.

We could fundamentally change our ways of living to reduce the need to travel at all - working from home, living in high-density housing developments with proper shopping and other facilities nearby, eating locally grown food, and cutting down the number of foreign holidays we take.

In a city such as York, says Coun Christian Vassie, the city council's environmentally-conscious chairman of planning and transport, we have a responsibility to think now about our future transport needs, and not just hide our heads in the sand.

Tinkering about to try to reduce car use, and to develop more fuel-efficient cars and buses, will help stave off the inevitable: but it won't be enough.

"If we were able to look ahead to a York in 100 years time and all we had achieved were slightly different-shaped cars or buses, I think we would have failed," he says. "It's a challenge of vision. We have to start asking the real questions of how we envisage a completely different mode of transport."

Here are a few suggestions....

Alternative fuels

We do not have to build cars that run on petrol. It would be easy enough to have them run on other fuels. York's Mount School has already shown how it could be done, by running a car on vegetable oil from their kitchen. Two possibilities are:

Hydrogen - there's no for there ever to be a shortage of hydrogen, and the only emission from hydrogen-powered cars is water vapour. The trouble is, you have to produce the hydrogen in the first place. That involves using electricity to obtain hydrogen from water. To generate enough to fuel 2.5 billion cars, however, would take huge quantities of electricity - which would have to be generated somehow, points out Prof Whitelegg.

Biofuel - fuel to run cars can be made from a number of crops, including Yorkshire rapeseed. Prof Whitelegg can see no reason why as many as ten per cent of vehicles could not be fuelled by biodiesel. But probably not much more than that. The main reason is that the land used to grow fuel crops could more beneficially be used to grow food.

More fuel-efficient cars

Car-makers put far too much effort into producing performance vehicles that go from 0-60mph quickly, and not enough into making cars that go further on less petrol, says Coun Vassie. Technologically, he says, there's no reason why they couldn't make cars that average 70-80 miles per gallon in an urban area, rather than the 20-25 we have today. It just needs a bit of will on the part of politicians and consumers.

Discourage car use

Congestion charging - one way of discouraging people to drive in urban areas such as York. Coun Vassie is not a fan, however.

"It just works against the poor, and against those with fuel-efficient cars," he says. "If you have a car that does ten miles a gallon, you pay the same as one that does 30.

"As long as you can afford to pay, it doesn't encourage you to have a more fuel-efficient car."

Intelligent parking - It may in future be possible to have intelligent parking systems that can recognise your car, recognise how fuel-efficient it is, and electronically charge you for parking accordingly, Coun Vassie says.

Owners of cars that are more fuel efficient could, for example, pay only half of what owners of less efficient cars would have to pay to park in York. It depends on the technology, says Damon Copperthwaite, the council's acting assistant director for development and planning. "But the possibilities are not that far away."

Alternative transport

Coun Vassie would love to see a monorail system in York, although he knows many would object that it would spoil the city's historic look. He remains unrepentant.

An electrified monorail running into the city centre from park and ride sites every 25 minutes along some of York's green fingers or main roads, or linking large developments such as Germany Beck with the university (and even the university's proposed new campus) would enable people to get about the city without needing to set foot in a car or bus, he says.

"Why is it that people throw up their hands at the idea of a monorail sweeping gracefully into the city, but accept the fact that for three hours a day the city walls are encircled by queues of metal boxes pumping out fumes?

"We have to think radically about different ways of moving about."

Lifestyle

The bigger picture is that we have to change the way we live if we are to cut down our reliance on oil, says Prof Whitelegg. There are a number of areas to consider...

Planning - perhaps the key to reducing our reliance on fuel, says the professor. If instead of building tens of thousands of new homes spread out across the countryside every year, we concentrated them in more dense developments, each provided with everything they needed in terms of shops, medical care, post offices and so on, we could greatly reduce the need to travel. New homes could also be made much more fuel efficient - with roof tiles doubling as solar panels, for instance, that could generate up to 50 per cent of the home's energy needs.

Aviation - a huge problem, says Prof Whitelegg. The government plans to triple the number of flights made in and from the UK by the year 2030, and is investing heavily in new runways. It is not sustainable.

Food - another huge problem.

We need to radically rethink our food distribution systems, so that instead of food being flown around the world then hauled up and down the country ten times before reaching your plate, we eat more home-grown produce.

Prof Whitelegg and his colleagues did some research which revealed that 40 per cent of the impact on the environment caused by York citizens is because of the food we eat.

Bus and taxi prices

Public transport runs on petrol or diesel too. So will the recent oil price increases drive up bus and taxi fares?

Bus company First last increased their prices (by 10p for a single journey, 20p for a return) on July 3. There are no immediate plans for a further hike, but First is a commercial organisation which relies entirely on fares for its income, says First York commercial director Peter Edwards. If oil prices continue to go up, the increased cost would ultimately have to be passed on to passengers. Any decision would be made by the First group, he says, not First in York.

City of York Council sets the fares taxis in York are allowed to charge. They were last reviewed in May, and will not be reviewed again until next year, says deputy council leader Coun Andrew Waller. So no immediate increase there.

Oil depletion curve

Many geologists believe there were only ever about two trillion barrels of recoverable oil in the world, of which half is now gone. At the moment, worldwide consumption is about 84 million barrels a day, or 30 billion barrels a year. Demand has been increasing at three per cent a year - and may go up even further as China and India's oil demands increase.

"So we're in deep trouble," says Prof John Whitelegg of the Stockholm Environment Institute at York University.

Oil prices in the long term will therefore increase. At the moment, the world price is about $64 a barrel, says Prof Whitelegg says. By 2020, he says that could reach $100. Coun Vassie thinks it could be even worse. You complain about paying 90p for a litre of unleaded. He can see the day not too far off - in 30 years time, say - when you pay £10 a litre.

Updated: 11:16 Friday, August 12, 2005