Worth a Read: Lives Per Gallon
I just finished reading “Miles Lives per Gallon: The True Cost of Our Oil Addiction”. It’s an interesting book by Terry Tamminen, who is a special advisor on environmental issues to California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. In the book he tries to tally up the fully burdened cost of oil on society, including externalities like health costs and “defense” spending that aren’t a part of the price tag we see at the gas pump. It’s pretty data heavy, which I find appealing. That said, as in the Big Tobacco wars, it’s difficult to conclusively tie things like health problems directly to oil, except in the most glaringly obvious cases (e.g. Exxon Valdez cleanup, or pollution in Nigeria’s Delta region). While most of the book is grim, in the last few chapters he does offer some sunshine in the form of concrete suggestions on what you can do to reduce your usage of oil products.
It’s worth a read.
Updated 2007/03/24: corrected title of the book. Thanks Terry. (How embarrassing; to be caught in a typo by the book’s own author.)
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Terry Tamminen said,
March 24, 2007 @ 10:39 am
Thanks for the kind words, but one slight correction. The book is titled “LIVES Per Gallon: The True Cost of Our Oil Addiction”. We do indeed pay for our petroleum joy ride with lives and disease, which can be directly attributed to burning oil (the book explains how we know the difference between illnesses from oil pollution versus those caused by other toxins). Thanks again for the mention and I look forward to more feedback.
Igor said,
March 24, 2007 @ 1:12 pm
I really enjoyed someone finally saying what I have believed for many years. And then backing it up with facts and figures. A big WTG, Terry!
Catmoves said,
March 26, 2007 @ 5:35 pm
I was horrified to see that they want to rename the Exxon Valdez, and send it back into Alaskan waters with absolutely no improvement to its already proven weaknesses. Thanks, Terry, for pointing this out.