Abstract
After the Anthropocene, human settlements will likely have less available energy to move people and things. This paper considers the feasibility of five modes of transportation under two energy-constrained scenarios. It analyzes the effects transportation mode choice is likely to have on the size of post-Anthropocene human settlements, as well as the role speed and energy play in such considerations. I find that cars, including battery-electric cars, are not feasible under a highly energy-constrained scenario, that buses, metros, and walking are feasible but will limit human settlement size, and that cycling is likely the only mode of transportation that would make suburbs possible in an energy-constrained post-Anthropocene scenario.
Highlights
People living after the epoch of human dominance will likely control a smaller fraction of the Earth’s surface area, its material resources, and the other animals on and in it than they do today [1,2]
That if manufacture energy is included as part of the energy budget, one car, BEV or not, consumes five years of the post-Anthropocene energy budget via the energy demands of its manufacture alone, without being driven a meter. Note further that this energy-only analysis does not touch on the availability of rare earth metals and other materials needed to produce the amounts of BEVs needed for mass electrification, material in little demand by bicycles and walking shoes.) Hydrogen cars fare worse than BEVs on energy intensity metrics, falling somewhere between BEVs and internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles [24,25]
This article finds that the choice among different modes of transportation turns out to be non-trivial in energy-constrained scenarios
Summary
People living after the epoch of human dominance will likely control a smaller fraction of the Earth’s surface area, its material resources, and the other animals on and in it than they do today [1,2]. As a result, they will have less control over the energy flows and stocks on and in Earth, and less available energy with which to move and make things. I discuss the implications of these estimates for the mode choice, speed, and physical size of human settlements in a world after human dominance
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