Beating high fuel costs

With the price of gasoline now averaging over $3.50/gallon nationwide, many people are looking for ways to reduce the cost. The president is considering opening the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, and other drastic measures, to keep gasoline flowing through your fuel injectors. Renewable energy has even been getting more coverage lately. With all this rhetoric, there is one area that has been surprisingly overlooked, that has the potential to drop fuel expenses immediately, and we can do it now.

This answer is not hybrids, exotic hydrogen fuel cell, or battery powered vehicles. It is telecommuting. Just over 2% of workers consider their home to be their primary place of work. It is estimated that 40% of US workers hold jobs that could be done at home, which is approximately 50 million fewer automobiles driving on the roads each day. Considering an average commute is 32 miles round trip per day, with many people traveling far more than average, telecommuting could immediately cut over 72,000,000 gallons per day of fuel usage. In less than 1 year of telecommuting, around 206 days, it would conserve more gasoline than is held in the strategic petroleum reserve.

The ability to telecommute is increasing as technology progresses. High speed internet, encryption, instant messenging, video conferencing, and telepresence robots make the remote working experience more effective. It is even feasible to get remote surgery, as shown in this video of a surgery performed from 4,000 miles away in 2007 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2twLVL_jyP4