Getting Off Oil: Recent Leaps, Next Steps

by Amory Lovins In mid-2005, Rocky Mountain Institute launched a three-year effort to implement the ideas in our book, Winning the Oil Endgame – our detailed 2004 roadmap for getting the U.S completely off oil by the 2040s, without needing new taxes, subsidies, mandates, or federal laws. We felt this $3.6-million effort could be led by business for profit, because saving or displacing oil would cost only $15 per barrel (in 2000 dollars)-far below oil’s price. It might seem foolish to expect to shift such gigantic sectors as oil and cars. But by taking markets seriously, we saw leverage in "institutional acupuncture": find meridians and points where the business logic is congested and not flowing properly, then stick needles into carefully chosen sites to get it flowing. Some farsighted donors and foundations backed this ambitious experiment. Two and a half years later, it has exceeded expectations. Of the six sectors that must change to set the United States firmly on the journey beyond oil, I believe at least three, perhaps four, have already passed the "tipping point" beyond which the major efforts still required will become ever easier. The hardest and slowest sector is cars. But building on 17 years […]

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