Transportation Energy and Efficient Vehicles

Abstract

Over the course of millennia, transport of people and materials has been an essential component in the advance of civilization. Long limited to human, animal, and sail power, transportation changed dramatically with steam engines fueled by wood, then coal, and even more dramatically with combustion engines fueled by petroleum. In the last century, Europe and Asia developed primarily with emphasis on rail transport, and transport in the U.S. in the twentieth century focused on highway vehicle transport. Air transport has increased dramatically throughout the world in the last few decades, growing from less than 0.5 billion passengers in 1975 to 3.5 billion in 2016.