Electric cars hold key to green planet

Not only will battery-powered vehicles draw power from the electricity grid during recharging, but, when parked, they can also feed additional power back into the grid during periods of peak demand.

The automobile fleet will become part of the overall power grid, and will be managed efficiently (and remotely) to optimise the timing of recharging from, and returning power to, the grid.

Third, electric-powered vehicles will open up a new world of “smart” vehicles, in which sensor systems and vehicle-to-vehicle communications will enable collision protection, traffic routing, and remote management of the vehicle.

The integration of information technology and the vehicle’s propulsion system will thereby introduce new standards of safety, convenience, and maintenance.

These are visionary ideas, yet they are within technological reach. But implementing these concepts will require new forms of public-private partnership.

Broadband providers
Automakers, utility companies, broadband providers, and government road builders will each have to contribute to an integrated system. All of these sectors will require new ways of competing and cooperating with the others.

The public sector will have to put forward funding to enable the new generation of vehicles to reach commercialization – through R&D outlays, consumer subsidies, and support for complementary infrastructure (for example, outlets for recharging in public places).

The new age of the electric vehicle exemplifies the powerful opportunities that we can grasp as we make our way from the unsustainable fossil-fuel age to a new age of sustainable technologies.

Our climate negotiators today bicker with each other because they view the climate challenge only in negative terms: who will pay to reduce fossil-fuel use?
Yet Burns’ vision for the automobile reminds us that the transition to sustainability can bring real breakthroughs in the quality of life.

This is true not only in automobiles, but also in the choice of energy systems, building designs, urban planning, and food systems (remembering that food production and transport account for around one-sixth of total greenhouse gas emissions).

We need to rethink the climate challenge as an opportunity for global brainstorming and cooperation on a series of technological breakthroughs to achieve sustainable development.

By harnessing cutting-edge engineering and new kinds of public-private partnerships, we can hasten the worldwide transition to sustainable technologies, with benefits for rich and poor countries alike — and thereby find the basis for global agreements on climate change that have so far proven elusive.

Sachs is Professor of Economics and Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University.