Electric and Fuel-Cell Vehicles Are a Mirage.

• Author: BRADLEY, ROBERT L. JR.

Alternative vehicular technologies are, at best, decades away from mass commercialization.

OIL-BASED FUELS and the internal combustion engine are the kings of the transportation mountain. Of the world's approximately 650,000,000 motor vehicles, fewer than 1,500,000 are not powered by either gasoline or diesel fuel. Liquefied petroleum gas or compressed natural gas powers almost all alternatively fueled vehicles. This gives fossil fuels more than a 99.9% share of the planet's motor vehicle transportation market.

The dominance of fossil fuels in the transportation sector appears likely to continue in the 21st century, making it improbable or impossible for the transportation side of the energy market to contribute toward the carbon dioxide reduction mandated by the non-ratified Kyoto Protocol. This, indeed, may be a good thing. The benefits of carbon dioxide for enhanced photosynthesis appear to be more certain than the contribution of [CO.sub.2] to warming the planet significantly.

The cost of buying, driving, and maintaining gasoline-powered vehicles has declined steadily over time. The price of regular unleaded gasoline averaged $1.12 per gallon in 1998--a record low and less than half the price of 1981's high (in present dollars) of $2.39 per gallon. Even though it rose in 1999, as OPEC cut back on production, the cost was still well below that of the early 1980s. What is astounding about the low price is that state and Federal motor fuel taxation is at a record high, and some of the "free-market price" includes an ecological premium, given that environmental compliance costs that did not exist before are built in.

Of the many retail liquid products, only low-grade mineral water is cheaper than tax-laden motor fuel today. This points to the triumph of technology in converting crude oil into motor fuel and other products, a story not unlike the one of improving economies of turning natural gas, oil, and coal into electricity.

The affordability of motor fuel has also improved in terms of work-time pricing (the amount of work time an average laborer must put in to buy an asset). In the 1920s, a gallon of gasoline cost more than 30 minutes of labor. In the mid 1990s, the cost was six minutes and falling.

The declining work-time cost of an automobile, even with numerous advances in vehicle comfort and environmental performance, has been documented by W. Michael Cox and Richard Alm in a 1998 report to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas: "In the currency of work time, today's Ford Taurus costs about 17 percent less than the celebrated 1955 Fairlane and more than 70 percent less than the first Model T, introduced in 1908. And that's without any adjustment for quality. Early cars rarely had an enclosed body, tires couldn't be removed from rims and buyers had to purchase a separate anti-kickback device to prevent broken arms. Today's models embody literally hundreds of standard features--from air-conditioning and antilock brakes to computer-controlled carburetors [and injection systems] and CD players--making driving safer, more economical and more fun."

The environmental triumph of the internal combustion engine is as impressive as its increasing economy. The internal combustion engine and "antiseptic automobile traffic" solved the environmental problem of "horse emissions" earlier in the 20th century. As James Flink explained in The Automobile Age, "In New York City alone at the turn of the century, horses deposited on the streets every day an estimated 2.5 million pounds of manure and 60,000 gallons of urine, accounting for about two-thirds of the filth that littered the city's streets. Excreta from horses in the form of dried dust irritated nasal passages and lungs, then became a syrupy mass to wade through and track into the home whenever it rained. New York insurance actuaries had established by the turn of the century that infectious diseases, including typhoid fever, were much more frequently contracted...