Discuss Steps The U.S Government can take to reduce oil consumption in Research Paper

Discuss Steps The U.S Government can take to reduce oil consumption in the United States - Research Paper Example The United States is a highly developed country and also a high consumer of petroleum and allied products to meet its energy requirements. The major sectors that use these products are transportation on land, air and sea, heating of buildings, various manufacturing industries, domestic appliances such as lawn movers, generators, etc. Traditionally since colonization of the continent, the US has been dependent on Natural non-renewable resources such wood, coal, natural gas, petroleum, etc. The volume of consumption as varied over time, being high in the earlier decades due to various reasons such as perceived abundance, comparatively less efficient machines, automobiles, etc., affordability and a lifestyle that did not lay the required emphasis on judicial use of these resources with the idea of conservation, impact on environment, etc. largely due to ignorance and poor awareness of such issues. Before we look at the methods for energy conservation, let us briefly understand the various sectors that are consumers of energy. (Overview, U.S. EIA, 2012) The different sectors that are essential consumers of power and fuel are Industrial, Transport, Business & Commercial and Domestic sectors. In the light of the above, we will now explore and discuss the various alternatives especially in the Natural and Renewable energy sources and also enumerate the various ways in which energy consumption itself (irrespective of the source) can be reduced in the larger interest of minimizing the global impact on the environment, its harmful effects and resultant climate change. (Cleetus, R. et.al., 2009; Greene, D.L., 2011) The United States is by far the largest consumer of oil in the world at 20.6 million barrels per day (EIA, 2007), 60 per cent of which is imported. Of this, two-thirds is consumed by the Transport sector and ~44% by other