We Will Not Apologize for Our Way of Life

Obama’s Inaugural Address contained some great hints about what the Alternative Fuel industry can expect with his presidency.

At the forefront, the single phrase, “We will not apologize for our way of life…” says to me that Obama will work to enforce America’s status quo. For this article I will focus on the quo of car culture.

• » See also: CARB Unveils DriveClean, a New Web Tool to Help Consumers Pick Green Cars
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Restructure America?

From reader comments on my last post, a central argument emerged for how to deal with many of our current social problems. The proposed solution: Restructure America to a more “European” model with town centers and mass transit, eliminating the suburbs. This would eliminate the need for most short-trip drives and thereby encourages walking, community and health, while discouraging car ownership.

There are plenty of arguments against this idea: viability, cost, and most importantly, loss of personal choice on where and how to live. Personally, I choose to live in areas where I can walk to the grocery store - it is part of my quality of living. That said, I could never get behind a project that forced a way of life on others - if people value it, they will seek it out or create it.

Cars Will Still Reign

Obama is unapologetic for our way of life and this tells me that cars will still reign. Frankly, I don’t think we can change away from car-based culture at this point in time. There will be changes though, as told by this quote, “…each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet…“. By turning fuels and energy inefficiency into an issue of National Security, the floodgates of funding for alternative fuels and fuel technologies will open.

Endorsed Alternatives

Several alternative fuel sources were directly mentioned, “We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories.” This tells us solar power, wind power and biofuels (biodiesel and ethanol) are on Obama’s radar. It will be interesting to see what other technologies he supports - will he stand behind electric cars, hydrogen fuel cells, geothermal, hybrid technology, so called “clean coal“, nuclear power, tide power, etc? Will any old technologies or low technologies get renewed support, like rail, bicycles or even good old-fashioned walking? I for one am excited to see what change Obama brings to America.

Image credit: veni markovski at Flickr under a Creative Commons license

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