Ways to Save Energy on Transportation

Have you ever considered how you can save on your energy costs by adjusting your main method of transportation?

The first step is to determine the method of transportation that fits your needs and lifestyle. If you live in a city with abundant public transportation, you may wish to utilize it, while you may need to travel by car if you live in a rural area.

Car

There are many ways to save energy when traveling by car. One such way is to carpool with others as much as possible. By regularly carpooling with other people,you can likely work out a way to split fuel costs between all of the carpoolers, which allows everyone to save money. Additionally, this method effectively takes more cars off the road and helps the environment by lowering your carbon footprint.

Another important way you can save energy is to avoid traveling on busy thoroughfares during rush hour. Your trip will take a lot longer during rush hour, and the constant idling of stop-and-go traffic is incredibly wasteful from a fuel efficiency standpoint.To adjust for this, you might try adjusting your schedule to travel at a different time of day or changing your route to avoid clogged highways and roads.

Lastly, you can save money by efficiently mapping out a route each time you drive somewhere. For example, if you are running errands, mapping out a pathcan save you energy by reducing the total amount you have to drive due to an inefficient route. Additionally, planning ahead will help prevent you from forgetting one of your stops and having to drive out of your way, all while wasting fuel. Simply put, critical consideration all of your car trips will save you time and money.

In the long-term, there are also many ways to save money by properly maintaining your car.To learn more about this,visit the US Department of Energy’s website.

Public Transportation

Public transportation lowers the amount of energy used for transportation both in general and for the individual. Riding public transportation saves energy in general because, per person, the energy use of one vehicle is far lower than it would be if each person were to use a smaller vehicle like a car, motorcycle, or moped. Plus, individually, it’s often less expensive to travel using public transportation; the fare on public transportation vs.the cost of fueling a car may be competitive depending on the price of each. And when you factor in the costs of purchasing or leasing a vehicle, insuring that vehicle, parking, and any necessary maintenance, public transportation is almost alwayscheaper in the long-term.

If you already use public transportation as your primary method of traveling, there are still ways to improve the process to save even more energy. In order to reduce the number of trips on public transportation, try researching the most efficient route to take to work or anywhere else, in the hopes of reducing the number of transfers or other issues that might increase your costs. Planning your route and trips can be beneficial when running errands—especially if you are grocery shopping, which is made slightly more of a hassle on public transportation. Lastly, you may be able to lower your costs by purchasing a monthly or annual transportation pass, which lowers the cost per-trip.

Alternative Forms of Transportation

If you are looking to eliminate any sort of energy cost while traveling, you might consider alternative forms of transportation. These other “methods of transportation” require physical activity, such as walking, biking, rollerblading, skateboarding, or longboarding.While using one of these methods of transportation, you will receive valuable exercise without having to spend any money on transportation. However, this might not be practical for the entire year, especiallyif you live in a climate with extremely cold wintersor dangerously hot summers.

What is your preferred method of transportation? How do you save on your energy costs while traveling?