What Is Fuel Conservation?

Fuel conservation is an integral part of an energy conservation platform that most often concerns fossil fuels. Conservation is an effort to conserve or restrict the use of limited resources. In the context of fuel, conservation encompasses efforts to increase fuel efficiency, reduce fuel consumption and switch to more sustainable fuel alternatives.

There are many types of fuel, from wood to nuclear fuel rods. In the context of conservation, however, scientists and environmentalists are most concerned with hydrocarbons, or fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are created through certain subterranean pressures that change the fossilized remains of organic matter into coal, oil and natural gas deposits. Because fossil fuels result from an organic process that takes a long length of time, the availability of these deposits are limited.

Although fossil fuels are limited and only found in quantity in certain areas of the world, countries have come to rely on this type of fuel for almost everything related to the ordinary lives of consumers. Fossil fuels are used for everything from heating homes to powering automobiles. In addition to the world's heavy reliance on a limited natural resource, using fossil fuels has a negative impact on the environment. Some scientists and environmentalist think that burning fossil fuels damages the ozone layer that protects people from solar radiation and contributes to global warming.

As a whole the fuel conservation movement is an effort by governments, industries, scientists and activists to move consumers away from the consumption of fossil fuels. A fuel conservation platform within a country is typically multi-pronged. The government passes efficiency standards to encourage manufacturers to create products that need less fuel. It also funds scientific research into alternative fuel sources that are sustainable and will not deplete over time, such as solar and wind energy.

Meanwhile, manufacturers design products to meet energy efficiency standards and to innovate their way into a position of market leadership. Activists and nonprofit organizations develop ratings systems to let consumers evaluate the efficiency levels between products. In cooperation with government agencies, they also educate consumers in an effort to get them to change their patterns of consumption.

Fuel conservation is also an important concept in international politics and is a topic that can have a significant impact on a nation's economy. Oil, in particular, is a high-need fuel that is controlled in quantity by only a few nations in the world. The continuing effort to reduce dependency on these nations by emphasizing fuel conservation is a hot political topic in many countries. Likewise, the inability of countries to fully embrace the notion of fuel conservation means that their economies are vulnerable to supply interruptions and price increases that can catapult an economy into a period of hyper-inflation and recession.