Car travel is on the rise in the US, and so are greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector.
Vehicle miles traveled by light-duty vehicles — which include passenger cars and light-duty trucks — increased 46.1% between 1990 and 2018. And in 2018, the transportation sector was responsible for 28.2% of all US greenhouse gas emissions — the largest share of any sector — with light-duty vehicles generating over half of the emissions in this sector.
Meanwhile, both President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden expressed enthusiasm for electric vehicles at the first presidential debate. Biden relayed his plan to electrify the federal fleet and deploy charging stations at scale, while Trump said he would be “all for electric cars with big incentives.”
