The Greening of Transportation: Will Asia Lead the Way?

Dr. Richard Dasher, Director of the US-Asia Technology Management Center in Stanford's School of Engineering, provides an overview of new technologies and approaches coming from Asia that aim to improve the efficiency and environmental sustainability of vehicle design, fuels, and overall transportation system architectures, and that promote more efficient ways of using transportation for purposes from logistics to leisure travel.  Green technologies in transportation play a key role in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which in turn is an essential task in order to slow down climate change.  About 29 percent of all GHG emissions in the U.S. come from transportation. Rapid economic growth has put Asia at the forefront of this problem. In 2009, China surpassed the U.S. to become the world's largest market for automobiles, with 170 million cars on the road that year and an additional 220 million cars projected to be on the roads in China by 2020. This session also provides a framework to contextualize the subsequent sessions in this nine-week series of presentations by distinguished guest lecturers, who will bring in the newest information about green transportation technologies in Asia. Dr. Dasher has directed the US-ATMC since 1993, serving also as Executive Director of Stanford's Center for Integrated Systems since 1998. He travels extensively in major Asian markets as a public speaker and as an advisor to regional and national governments, companies, and nonprofit groups in regard to innovation, economic development, and start-up company success.

HP Auditorium