What big engine problems have been solved in the last 25 years?
As an historical trend, engines are getting better technically about one percent a year. So for example, the maximum power new engines deliver gets a little higher every year. And there’s a long list of things for people to develop and implement that will keep this going. Engines are a competitive market because there’s more production capacity than there is market. In parallel, we’ve had this remarkably successful reduction in emissions. Gasoline engine emissions have gone down by a factor of 100 in the past 35 years, and that’s a major factor in cleaning up air pollution. What are the next big engine problem to tackle? I spend some of my time on technology forecasting. It’s particularly critical now because the United States is using energy and petroleum in transportation in ways that are just profligate. Our energy and petroleum consumption steadily go up. Growth in other parts of the world is very likely to produce some severe strains over the next decade as well. So I’ve been iden
