In the past few months, fossil fuel prices have done exactly what someone who cares about climate change might want: They went up. And up. And up. Since January, the average retail price for gasoline nationwide has jumped by almost a dollar per gallon; across the country, drivers are spending at least $12 more every time they fill up their tanks. One Mobil station in Beverly Hills, California, made headlines when its "super" gasoline hit nearly $8 per gallon.
These price increases — brought about by the Russian invasion of Ukraine (Russia provides roughly 10 percent of the global supply of oil) and a continuing rebound in demand from the COVID-19 pandemic — have had deleterious effects on American consumers, who are already struggling with sky-high inflation. But some have suggested that the rising cost of oil could have a silver lining. Transportation is the largest source of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for almost 30 percent of the country's carbon footprint. Could rising gas prices change American driving enough to help curb global warming?
