How Can We Reduce Our Oil Consumption

For the past hundreds of years, people have been trying to make life for us humans easier and more convenient. This has led to making incredible inventions such as the telephone, the camera, the television, and then, the car. Now that people have succeeded in making our lives more convenient, we are going to have to face the disadvantages that go with it. We started global warming, and now it’s our job to stop it.
    The discovery of petroleum has been one of the major causes in causing our global crisis in the first place and  one way we can start helping our world is by reducing our oil consumption. Beside the obvious reasons on reducing oil consumption which includes walking, biking, or just using a fuel efficient car, people will be surprised to learn that there are so many of ways our society can reduce oil consumption and it’s dependence on foreign countries for an oil supply. The use of oil is doing so much damage to our world.
    Logically, as gas prices get higher higher, the amount people will use will get lower and lower. This will lead to making cars that get better mileage and they will be cheaper so that customers are more attracted to buying them. Some people will move closer to their jobs and others will simply purchase fewer airline tickets. All around us, people have already started to adapt to the world’s gas crisis. The problem with depending so much on a nonrenewable resource is that once it’s gone, it’s gone forever. And that’s exactly whats happening, right before our own eyes.Over the past few decades, cars have been a huge part of peoples lives. We depend on them for transportation, and some of us even depend on cars to make a living. The benefits of a car are all what humans realize. What we don’t usually consider is all the disadvantages, of which there are quite a lot. Is a little benefit of something worth all the destruction it’s causing?
    The Earth’s atmosphere is extremely thin and due to all the pollution humans cause, the atmosphere becomes thicker and thicker. And the thicker the atmosphere, the more infrared radiation and heat it is able to trap. As global warming continues, the amount of carbon dioxide in the world has also continued to rise, and along with it, the temperature has gone up too. Over the world the major causes of global warming are: carbon dioxide from certain power plants, the carbon dioxide emitted form cars, and the carbon dioxide from planes and buildings. Power plants add about 50% of the carbon dioxide in the world, and cars, especially ones with low mileage are responsible for roughly 33%. Even  natural causes that include forest fires add a percentage of all the carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere every year.
    The United States has developed quite a reputation on being the world’s largest oil consumers. Every hour, the United States spends 13 million dollars on buying foreign oil and while we use roughly 20 million barrels a day, the next most oil consuming country only uses 6. However, as of late March, U.S. gas prices averaged around $3.45 a gallon, but amazingly, even though we are the world’s largest oil consuming country, we are still among the cheapest places to buy oil. This compares to roughly $8 per gallon in various parts of Europe. In the country of Bosnia-Herzegovina, gas prices have skyrocketed to an amazing $10.86 per gallon and in the United Kingdom, gas prices are well near $9.Then in other part of the world, gas prices are almost ridiculously cheap. In Venezuela it’s only a mere 12 cents a gallon and in Saudi Arabia, it’s a low 45 cents per gallon. But getting rid of global warming doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to completely get rid of cars. There are so many ways that we can start reducing global warming by just adjusting a few things on our cars that will not only save us money, but will do the whole world good.
    Every year, the United States looses 147 million gallons to evaporation because of loose tank caps. If every person in the United States took just  a mere half a minute to make sure their cap was tight, just think how much oil would be saved. Keeping properly inflated tires can increase your car’s mileage by almost 4% and if every car followed the speed limit on the highways, their car would not loose it’s mileage by an astonishing 33% which would have happened if they went 15 miles per hour more than the actual speed limit. Replacing a clogged air filter can increase a car’s mileage by a descent 10% and if some people altered their commute time, they would save time and money because they wouldn’t be caught in traffic jams during a rush hour. Doing simple things such as these can do so much for our world.
    Year by year, global warming has changed the world incredibly. Once large bodies of water are now nearly gone and many wild life species are in danger of extinction because of the constantly melting polar ice caps. People are going in danger too. If all the ice caps melt, the sea level will rise so much that at least the lives of half a billion are at risk. Global warming is the consequence of our newer and newer science. If we don’t fix it now, it’s going to be too late. According to H.G. Wells, “Adapt or perish, now more than ever, is nature inexplicable imperative.”  The planet earth is the only home we’ll ever have, so we might as well take special care of it.