Deputy President Kamala Harris and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg on Monday pushed for a shift to clean energy and electric vehicles as Americans grapple with record high gas station prices.
As gas prices rise and more workers return to the office and the number of covids falls, the President Joe BidenThe administration announced a $3.7 billion increase in spending on public transportation, including investment in new fleets of electric buses.
“We are all in the middle of a turning point. We have the technology to transition to a zero-emission fleet,” Harris said during the announcement. “We can handle the climate crisis and grow our economy at the same time.”
Buttigieg also emphasized that the money would help the environment.
“Transit gets passengers where they need to be efficient and affordable, with far less pollution, in order to thrive. And that’s even good for car drivers, because it means less congestion and less traffic on our roads. And transport is even better when it is clean transport with modern electric buses that do not pollute the environment at all,” he said.
Vice President Kamala Harris announced the Biden administration’s transition to clean energy and electric vehicles.
Transportation Minister Pete Buttigieg and Vice President Kamala Harris talked about the environmental benefits of electric vehicles, but did not mention rising gasoline prices.
Prior to the 2008 recession, a barrel of crude oil cost $150. We are on the right track to reach and potentially exceed this crisis mark, which puts the entire economy at risk. (The chart above shows Steven Schork’s forecast for summer 2022 retail gas prices approaching recession levels)
No official sources mentioned gas prices: on Sunday, AAA reported that the national average price per gallon of gas had reached $4,009, the highest since 2008.
Gas station prices have been rising long before Russia invaded Ukraine and have risen faster since the start of the war. The U.S. national average per gallon of gasoline rose 45 cents a gallon last week to top $4.06 on Monday, according to the Auto Club AAA.
The price of regular gasoline on Sunday topped $4 a gallon for the first time in nearly 14 years and is now up nearly 50% from a year ago.
The price of gasoline in Europe is even higher, averaging €1.75 per liter last week, according to the European Commission, equivalent to $7.21 per gallon.
GasBuddy, which tracks prices to the level of gas stations, said on Monday that the US is likely to break the record price of $4.10 a gallon, but that doesn’t account for inflation. In today’s conditions, the record price will be about $5.24 adjusted for inflation.
Oil prices soared early Monday before retreating. In the middle of the day, US benchmark oil rose 2% to about $118 a barrel, while the world price rose 4% to about $123 a barrel. Major US stock indexes fell by about 2%.
The United States is the world’s largest oil producer, ahead of Saudi Arabia and Russia, but it is also the largest consumer of oil, and it cannot meet this overwhelming demand with domestic oil alone.
The US imported 245 million barrels of oil from Russia last year — about 8% of all US oil imports — compared to 198 million barrels in 2020. That’s less than what the US receives from Canada or Mexico, but more than it imported last year from Saudi Arabia. .
The administration announced additional funding for public transport, which has been hit hard by telecommuting during the pandemic – Vice President Kamala Harris (left to right), Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan, Federal Transportation Administration Administrator Nuria Fernandez and Mark St. Firmin, electric bus driver at the ad
Russia’s increasingly vicious assault on Ukraine has heightened calls to cut Russia off from the money it receives from oil and natural gas exports. Europe is heavily dependent on Russian gas.
President Joe Biden was reluctant to ban Russian oil, fearing it could fuel inflation ahead of the midterm elections this November.
But on Monday, officials announced that the administration is distributing $2.2 billion in coronavirus relief under the American Rescue Plan to 35 transportation agencies in 18 states. Public transport has been hit hard during the pandemic, with ridership dwindling due to telecommuting.
The money will be used to support day-to-day operations, including staffing and payroll, as well as cleaning and disinfection to limit the spread of the disease.
Another $1.5 billion in grants will be made available under the bipartisan infrastructure law — a total of $7.5 billion over five years — to transportation agencies to buy low- or zero-emission buses and build bus stations. This is more than double the total amount compared to the previous year.
Several transport systems are already moving towards electric buses. By 2040, California, as well as New York and Boston, have committed to building all-electric bus fleets. Washington DC has set a target for 2045. Transportation is the biggest US contributor to global warming.
The effort comes at a challenging time for public transport.
According to the American Public Transportation Association, only about 55% of transit passengers across the country have returned compared to pre-pandemic times. The biggest losses were in commuter train systems serving suburban white-collar commuters traveling downtown for work.
As the number of COVID-19 cases declined, Biden urged Americans to stop working from home, calling a return to the office necessary to boost economic growth. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that about 90% of the US population lives in counties where the risk of contracting coronavirus is a low to moderate threat, meaning residents do not need to wear masks in most indoor settings.
“It’s time for America to get back to work and refill our big cities with people,” Biden said in his address to Congress.
Among the beneficiaries of Monday’s COVID-19 relief funds were the transportation systems of large cities, which have been hit hard by loss of revenue due to reduced passenger traffic. The New York City Transit System, the nation’s largest, received $769 million to keep it running, while the San Francisco Bay Area Expressway received $270 million to support service and safety protocols.
Other grant recipients were the $120 million Washington, D.C. subway system, as it involves returning federal employees to offices, and the $137 million Houston Public Transit, which greatly increased the number of bus rapid transit lines.
“These funds are critical to avoid drastic service cuts and layoffs that will hurt the economy and public health,” said Nuria Fernandez, head of the Federal Transportation Authority, which oversees the grants.
At the beginning of the pandemic, transportation agencies cut wages and reduced services. This happened even as essential workers, who are disproportionately non-white and have lower incomes, continued to rely on public transportation to get to work.
But three rounds of federal emergency COVID-19 relief, totaling nearly $70 billion, including the $30.5 billion Biden signed last year, have pulled the transportation agencies to the brink of financial collapse.