Autonomous vehicles revolutionizing economy: Study

SAN FRANSISCO, CA – Most trucking industry experts would agree that autonomous trucks are inevitable. Ditto driverless cars. Now combine those technologies with the arrival of alternative fuels and transportation-as-service organizations like Uber. The end result,  according to a new study, will be “one of the fastest, deepest, most consequential disruptions of transportation in history.” That’s how Tony Seba, co-author of a “Clean Disruption of Energy and Transportation,” sums up his research.”

Seba is one of the directors of the RethinkX Research group and he has just published a study that says because of alternative fuels and autonomous vehicles, come 2030, North American transportation will see a shift that will “end over 100 years of individual vehicle ownership and reshape the world’s energy economy in the process.” There will be fewer trucks, far fewer drivers.  Insurance companies will be forced to adapt; even the health-care system will feel the ramifications. 

Employing existing technologies and using well-established cost curves, the report projects that “within 10 years of the regulatory approval of driverless vehicles, 95% of U.S. passenger miles travelled will be served by on-demand autonomous electric vehicles and the number of passenger cars on the American roads will drop from 247 million in 2020 to 44 million in 2030.

“As demand for new vehicles plummets, 70% fewer passenger cars and trucks will be manufactured each year. This could result in total disruption of the car value chain, with car dealers, maintenance and insurance companies suffering almost complete destruction.”

Says Seba’s co-author James Arbib: “As with any market disruption, there will be winners as well as losers. Job losses in the driving, manufacturing and oil and gas sectors will be a key concern. But huge opportunities will open up as well-from broad economic growth stimulated by consumer saving and spending to more focused growth in vehicle operating systems, computer platforms and Transportation as a Service. 

Sound far-fetched? Click here to download the report and make up your own mind.