TY - JOUR
T1 - Fuel saving and ridesharing in the US
T2 - Motivations, limitations, and opportunities
AU - Jacobson, Sheldon H.
AU - King, Douglas M.
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors wish to thank two anonymous referees for their insightful comments. This material is based upon work supported in part by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0457176. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation. The computational work was conducted with support from the Simulation and Optimization Laboratory at the University of Illinois.
PY - 2009/1
Y1 - 2009/1
N2 - Ridesharing can reduce the fuel consumed in noncommercial passenger highway vehicles by grouping individuals into fewer vehicles and reducing the number of miles that vehicles must travel. We estimate the potential fuel savings that could result from an increase in ridesharing in the US. If no additional travel is required to pick up passengers, adding one additional passenger for every 100 vehicles would reduce annual fuel consumption by 0.80-0.82 billion gallons of gasoline per year; if one passenger were added in every 10 vehicles, the potential savings would be 7.54-7.74 billion gallons per year. However, ridesharing may require extra travel to pick up additional passengers, which can reduce and possibly eliminate potential fuel savings. The tradeoff between saving fuel and spending time to pick up additional passengers is investigated, finding that, on average, ridesharing may not be attractive to travelers, but can be made more attractive by increasing per-vehicle-trip costs such as parking and tolls.
AB - Ridesharing can reduce the fuel consumed in noncommercial passenger highway vehicles by grouping individuals into fewer vehicles and reducing the number of miles that vehicles must travel. We estimate the potential fuel savings that could result from an increase in ridesharing in the US. If no additional travel is required to pick up passengers, adding one additional passenger for every 100 vehicles would reduce annual fuel consumption by 0.80-0.82 billion gallons of gasoline per year; if one passenger were added in every 10 vehicles, the potential savings would be 7.54-7.74 billion gallons per year. However, ridesharing may require extra travel to pick up additional passengers, which can reduce and possibly eliminate potential fuel savings. The tradeoff between saving fuel and spending time to pick up additional passengers is investigated, finding that, on average, ridesharing may not be attractive to travelers, but can be made more attractive by increasing per-vehicle-trip costs such as parking and tolls.
KW - Carpooling
KW - Fuel consumption
KW - Ridesharing
KW - Statistical models
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U2 - 10.1016/j.trd.2008.10.001
DO - 10.1016/j.trd.2008.10.001
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:57449121974
SN - 1361-9209
VL - 14
SP - 14
EP - 21
JO - Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment
JF - Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment
IS - 1
ER -