Environmental impact due to automobile use

Edwan Fernandes Fioravante, Centro de Desenvolvimento e Planejamento Regional (CEDEPLAR)
Moema G.B. Figoli, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais

Due to demographic changes that have been occurred, this article had the objective of projecting the number and composition of households of Belo Horizonte (Brazil) by household size and marital status and age of reference person, using a multidimensional model developed by Yi (1991) that considers the interdependence between demographic events. Between 2000 and 2050, the population will rise 3,1%; while the number of households will rise 37,8%. To evaluate the influence of the change of the household composition, the standard of automobile ownership observed in 2000 was used. The forecasted fleet of Belo Horizonte will rise until 2035, reaching 743.214 automobiles. In 2007, the observed fleet already corresponded to 730.468 automobiles, indicating the additional effect of others variables, for example, the economical ones. However the ambient impact did not occur with the same intensity, because some old vehicles were substituted by new ones that have lower emission of pollutants.