Cascadia's profligate energy consumption lies at the root of many of the region's most serious problems. Each barrel of oil we burn for highway fuels adds nearly half a ton of climate-warming gases to the atmosphere; releases perhaps 60 pounds of carbon monoxide, soot, and smog-forming compounds that endanger our health; siphons between $40 and $140 out of the local economy; increases the risk of oil spills and pipeline leaks; and entangles our region with some of the most volatile and politically unstable regimes in the world. Cascadians consume more than 300 million of those barrels each year. Coal and natural gas carry similar costs. Even hydropower dams, though comparatively benign in their climate impacts, cut salmon off from vast areas of spawning habitat.

The Cascadia Scorecard measures highway fuels and non-industrial electricity, but not other forms of energy, for three reasons. First, highway fuels and electricity consumption are closely monitored, and the data is reliably updated and released with little delay. Second, Cascadians themselves have control over their consumption of these commodities, while short-term trends in many other forms of energy consumption -- such as home heating fuels or industrial energy consumption -- respond to forces of weather and global markets that are largely outside Cascadians' control. And third, the combination of highway fuels and non-industrial electricity has been a fairly reliable proxy for overall energy consumption in the region. Between 1978 and 2000, consumption of highway fuels and non-industrial electricity accounted for 34 percent of total energy use in Cascadia, never varying from this level by more than 2 percentage points in any year.
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Germans enjoy high standards of living while consuming far less energy per person than northwesterners do. Moreover, that nation has aggressively pursued efficiency and renewable energy policies in recent years. While Germany still emits far more than its share of global-warming emissions from fossil fuels, it nevertheless stands as a developed-world model that Cascadia can aspire to match.

A technical note: Sightline recently re-estimated Germany's energy consumption, based on newly accessible data, and determined that the nation's performance on the energy indicator in 2001 was likely even better than Sightline had estimated when the Cascadia Scorecard was launched. Cascadia may have an even steeper task ahead if it is to match Germany's performance on personal energy consumption. (Click to read more about Germany's energy consumption.)
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The relatively flat line for long-term energy use, however, conceals three diverging trends. Gasoline consumption, measured per person, has been falling in Cascadia since the late 1990s -- a decade-long trend that, until recently, had gone largely unnoticed. (Click for chart of Northwest gasoline consumption.) Diesel fuel use, on the other hand, had been on a long-term upswing; but soaring energy prices in 2008 contributed to the largest year-over-year decrease in diesel consumption since the early 1980s. Meanwhile, electricity use in Cascadia's homes and businesses has remained stuck in high gear for decades.
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But rising fuel prices have put a crimp in Cascadia's thirst for gasoline. As fuel prices peaked in 2008, the effects were unmistakeable: Cascadians flocked to transit; bought fewer gas-guzzlers and more economy cars; and drove less. Federal data, in fact, show that vehicle travel is on the decline throughout the United States.

Because of these changes, and despite a 15 percent increase in population over the last decade, Cascadians used no more gasoline in 2008 than in 1998. In the Northwest states, these two trends -- increasing population and flat consumption -- combined to reduce gasoline consumption per person last year to its lowest level since 1965. The trends are most pronounced in Idaho, where per-person gasoline consumption has fallen by more than one-fifth in a single decade.

High prices even trimmed our demand for diesel trucking fuel, which had risen steadily for decades. Globalization of both manufacturing and farming has increased the distance between consumers and producers. But recent increases in diesel prices, coupled with a sputtering economy, have led to cutbacks and efficiencies in long-distance trucking.

Fuel consumption has fallen more rapidly in the Northwest states than in British Columbia. Yet residents of the Northwest states still use about 44 percent more gasoline per person than their counterparts in British Columbia, and about 40 percent more overall, after including the Scorecard's diesel and electricity measures. (Click for chart of regional energy consumption.)

Despite recent cutbacks in highway fuel consumption, high prices pushed 2008 energy spending to a record high. The Northwest states spent more than $28 billion to import oil, natural gas, and coal last year -- a four-fold increase in just a decade. (Click for chart of energy import spending in the Northwest states.)

Perhaps the biggest surprise in the Scorecard's energy indicator is the recent rise in electricity consumption. Higher prices in 2000 through 2002 (the result of a west-coast energy crisis) quelled consumption, but only temporarily: between 2003 and 2008, total electricity consumption by Cascadia's homes and businesses rose by roughly 12 percent, a rise that outpaced population growth.

Recent cutbacks in fuel consumption don't guarantee continued progress; if economic recovery is coupled with low fuel prices, consumption could come roaring back. Real progress will require a conscious choice to trim our fossil fuel use. A critical step is to design policies that make energy prices tell the truth. As expensive as a gallon of gasoline may have seemed in mid-2008, the price still failed to cover the costs of global warming, air pollution, petroleum-related military spending -- or even the costs of streets and roads.

As recent trends show, Cascadians can trim wasteful energy consumption when given the right incentives. Ensuring that all consumers pay the full cost of their energy purchases -- rather than pushing those costs onto their neighbors or their grandchildren -- can help create an economy that is simultaneously more efficient and more fair.
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Spending on energy imports, Northwest states

Energy use, Northwest states vs. BC

Per capita gasoline consumption, Northwest states

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