Remarks at a Meeting on Energy Conservation in New Brunswick, New Jersey

When they told me that Congressman Eddie Patten was going to make a speech just 1 minute long, I decided to come and hear it. [Laughter] And I was not disappointed. I can't believe it. I'm sure he's going to finish his speech after I'm gone. [Laughter]

I know all of you weren't here when I arrived at the airport and came down through this beautiful community, and I wish you could have seen the tremendous, friendly reception that I got.

I remember the turning point in Brendan Byrne's campaign. He told me when they waved at him with all five fingers he knew he had it made. [Laughter] That's an actual quote from Brendan. [Laughter] [ think he used it all over New Jersey, and I can't think of a more vivid description of a turning point in a political campaign than that one.

I'm here to talk to you about a very serious matter. And you have distinguished leaders on the platform with me who are an integral part of the process of protecting the interests of our people individually and collectively and also repairing a very serious threat to the very security of our country.

We import now about half of all the oil we use—8 1/2 million barrels a day; next year, $70 billion worth. And along with oil we import inflation and unemployment. Our inflation rate right now would be 4 percentage points lower if you didn't have to count energy. And if you just take that one factor out—energy—the inflation rate in '79 would be no higher than it was in '78, no higher than it was in '77. You see what a tremendous impact this has had on our country, and it's getting worse, not better, provided we don't act.

The best way to cut imports is not to drill for more oil or to burn more coal or even to use more advanced synthetic fuels. The best way to cut our imports is to save, to stop wasting, to conserve energy. And that's why we're here this afternoon—to talk about a special way to save energy.

There are many ways. And I hope that every family represented here, before you go to bed tonight, will get your family together, from little children 5 years old all the way up to grandparents or even great-grandparents and say, "How can we in our own lives and using our own influence in our homes, to and from jobs, on the job, cut down on the waste of energy, save energy?"

Our country's doing a fairly good job so far. We've got a long way to go. Half the oil that we use in this country is not only imported, but half of it is used in transportation. And obviously the biggest potential saving in oil is in transportation.

I got word, after I took off in Air Force One, today that the Senate Finance Committee has passed the windfall profits tax—much lower tax on the unearned profits of the oil companies than I had wanted or anticipated. And I hope that with Bill Bradley's good work and others—Pete Williams—that on the floor of the Senate we can restore to the American people what has been lost so far in the Senate Finance Committee in taxing these profits which the oil companies have not earned.

These taxes will be used for several reasons: One is to help the poor families of our Nation pay the rapidly increasing cost of energy. Another one is to improve the quality of transportation, public transportation. And over the next 10 years, we've set aside $3 1/2 billion for research and development to make sure that we have more efficient transportation vehicles. We can save about 75,000 barrels a day for every mile per gallon that we cut off the gas-burning automobiles. There's a tremendous savings there.

But I want to talk this afternoon, just for a few minutes, about ridesharing-ridesharing. It's not anything complicated; it's carpools, vanpools, subscription buses, public transit, and so forth. This saves fuel. It preserves our environment. It maintains personal mobility, and it helps the income and the standard of living of families simply because they stop wasting the money that they earn.

Over 50 million Americans every day commute to and from work in an automobile by themselves—one passenger. And if you doubt what I say, the next time you take a trip—I'm sure your car will be full— [laughter] —just look at the cars you meet. This is a tremendous waste, 150 million unoccupied spaces for American riders every day—we've only got 220 million people in our country—and that's just the cars going to and from work.

These spaces, if filled, would be just as valuable as drilling a new well to find more oil. So far, about 20 percent of all the commuters share a ride or ride on public transportation, about 20 percent. If we could just change that 1 percent-and I have no doubt that we can, with the help of people like Brendan Byrne and Tom Bradley—1. percent change in that percentage would save about 175 million gallons of gas per year—175 million. And that would take care of all the transportation in automobiles of New Jersey for 18 days.

And as you can well figure out, if one car is filled and the ride costs are shared, then a person can travel a whole week and tap the family budget for the same thing that it costs per day if one travels alone.

You've already begun some initiatives in New Jersey that are important. Governor Byrne has spoken out forcefully for vanpooling and car sharing. Local governments have already taken action. And Prudential Insurance Company, for instance, has one of the best car sharing programs in the whole Nation. Twenty-three hundred people commute to work each day in 208 vans, under the aegis of Prudential Insurance Company, in the Newark area. Johnson and Johnson has helped, AT&T has helped, Nabisco has helped, Allied Chemical has helped, and others.

This is a difficult thing to do without some high degree of coordination and help from local governments, from the State and the Federal Governments. In the past, we've really had more obstacles to ridesharing than we've had assistance or help for ridesharing programs. And I have started an initiative, encouraged by people like Brendan Byrne and Tom Bradley, to do more at the Federal level. We hope that if we can be successful, we can save as much as half a million barrels of oil per day before this next decade is over.

We'll extend the 10-percent tax investment credit to vanpools. We'll guarantee to multiple-rider vehicles that gasoline will be available if there should be shortages in the future. There will be a high priority allocation of gasoline to vehicles that have multiple riders. We'll issue an Executive order upgrading the ridesharing efforts for Federal employees.

We're already taking some very controversial steps by charging some Federal employees for parking privileges. In the past they've got free parking privileges in Washington. Space is at a premium, and this encourages, as you can well see, one passenger per car.

In our Department of Transportation, we're trying to move toward special highway lanes for commuter passengers and for public transit vehicles, and this would amount to about $250 million a year in extra help for these kinds of construction projects in this next decade. And we also anticipate granting interest-free loans for the purchase of vans.

One problem has been that the insurance companies need to reassess automobile insurance charges to make it attractive for a person to have a van or a station wagon .or others that are shared by other employees going to and from work. And we'll seek model State laws, because it's very difficult to have adequate vanpooling projects if a city is near a State line, unless there is some standardization of State laws themselves.

We've also organized a National Task Force on Ridesharing, and we have, luckily, the national chairman here with us this afternoon, whom I'll introduce in just a minute. We've got an outstanding young former mayor, Neil Goldschmidt, who is now the Secretary of Transportation. I think in the city of Portland, which he served before he came into my Cabinet recently, has one of the finest energy conservation programs of which I have ever heard. And he will be working intimately with any local official group or private employer group that needs help in evolving and implementing and continuing a good rideshare program.

It's now my pleasure—I want to take two pleasures. One is to thank you for coming and for letting me be a part of this program, although I am passing through your meeting very briefly. The reception that I've received is exhilarating and very gratifying to me. We've got a great and wonderful country that's facing a difficult challenge. And I think that anyone in the Congress or perhaps any of you who try to deal with the problem of evolving a comprehensive energy program, knows that it's been a very slow, tedious, and difficult thing. There have been no accolades coming forth for those who took the initiative. There have been no votes gained. It's been a losing proposition all around politically, but it's the right thing to do.

It requires a great deal of initiative. It requires a great deal of courage. It requires a deal more unity than we've had so far among the people of our Nation. And it requires all of you who are in positions of leadership to make sure that this issue is kept in the forefront, because I tell you, from the bottom of my heart as President, that our Nation's very security is at stake.

You saw what happened this past summer with very slight reductions in oil imports-the near panic that developed around Los Angeles, where Tom Bradley is the mayor, and in some places on the east coast because there was a slight shortage of gasoline. Think what would happen—and God forbid its happening-if we had a total embargo, as heavily dependent as we are on foreign oil. It would be a devastating blow to our country. We have got to have more energy produced in our own country. We've got to have a great saving in the energy that we consume and, therefore, to reduce imports.

Every effort helps, and the effort that we are launching on a nationwide basis this afternoon, in this courthouse in Middlesex County, in New Brunswick, can have a great beneficial effect in the future-500,000 barrels in saving per day for our Nation if this seed that we plant among you takes root and sprouts and grows. And what you do here and throughout New Jersey can be an inspiration to the rest of the country. I call on you to join in enthusiastically. We'll provide the seed money to help Brendan Byrne and local officials make this a possibility.

I thank you for coming, but I particularly want to express my thanks to Tom Bradley, the great mayor of Los Angeles, whose leadership has really been an inspiration to every other public official in this country, including the President.

Tom Bradley has volunteered to be the national chairman of the ridesharing program, because he sees the potential that can be realized. He sees the difficulty of a sustained effort, but he's the kind of leader, I'm sure, that can bring this effort to fruition and help our Nation in the process and at the same time help every American who participates.

Now I'd like to introduce my friend, Tom Bradley. Tom.