How To Reduce Greenhouse Gases...Raise the Speed Limit!

At least, that's what One Hand Clapping suggests here. He points out that for many trips, it makes more sense to drive than to fly if your primary concern is carbon dioxide production. But it takes a long time to drive at 65 or 75 mph, compared to flying.

This last weekend, my wife and I drove to Rexburg, Idaho--which was about a five hour drive. Speed limits on I-84 for most of the distance we drove are 75 mph. I actually set the cruise control at 82 mph for most of the trip to Rexburg, and coming back, I set the cruise control at 90 mph. While we passed a lot of trucks, I would say that based on the cars that we passed or that passed us, our speed was about 65th or 70th percentile. We passed more cars than passed us, but not dramatically so.

On much of I-84, in daylight, you can set the speed limit at perhaps 100 mph, and I doubt that it would make much of a difference in accident or death rates. This would cut at least an hour off the drive--perhaps more--and make me less tempted to fly the next time we go to Rexburg.

But is it safe? Unlike a lot of the other highways, I-84 is fenced, so there's almost no wildlife (and no livestock) crossing the road. I-84 is also a controlled access road, so you don't have the vehicles pulling onto the highway, either.

The one area where I would be a bit concerned about raising the speed limit would be tires. I believe most passenger car tires sold in the U.S. now are S-speed rated (intended for unlimited use at 113 mph), but there are a lot of people out there who don't check their tire pressures, ever. A tire that is perfectly safe at 100 mph when properly inflated can suffer catastrophic failure if it is severely underinflated.