Periodic Report Summary - GHG-TRANSPORD (Reducing greenhouse-gas emissions of transport beyond 2020: linking R&D, transport policies and reduction targets)
Project context and objectives:
Transport currently contributes about 27 % of the total European Union (EU) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In a trend scenario, this share is expected to grow due to continued strong growth of transport demand, in particular of freight transport and air passenger trans-port, and slower efficiency improvements than for other GHG emitting sectors (EC DGTREN, European Energy and Transport: Trends to 2030 - update 2007, 2008).
Given the overall EU GHG reduction targets of 20 % until 2020 compared with the emission levels of 1990, or 30% if an international agreement is achieved, and of 60 to 80 % until 2050 (even -95 % is debated), it is obvious that in the future:
(1) the transport sector will have to contribute to GHG emission reductions such that
(2) reduction targets for the different transport modes have to be anticipated and
(3) aligned research strategies and transport policies have to be developed to efficiently and effectively meet these reduction targets for the medium to long term.
The GHG-TRANSPORD project aims at developing an integrated European strategy that links research and development (R&D) efforts with other transport policies and technological measures to achieve substantial GHG emission reductions in transport that are in line with the overall reduction targets of the EU. As part of this strategy, the project will propose GHG reduction targets for transport as a whole as well as for each transport mode for 2020 and 2050.
Project results:
The first activity completed in this reporting period, finalised an activity already started in the previous period. It concerned for the short listed promising measures to reduce GHG emissions of transport to assess the cost of each measure without considering the interrelationships between different measures. At this stage, it is important to analyse two elements of the cost:
(1) the additional cost of a measure today or at that point of time in the future when it will become available and introduced at the market; and
(2) the cost development over time as R&D, learning-by-doing and learning-by-using usually will enable to drive down the cost of new technologies or new processes.
In this period the analytical framework prepared in the previous reporting period was applied to measures in all modes and for alternative fuels. It turned out that the framework could be applied in a sophisticated manner for road transport and alternative fuels, while due to lack of studies or data application was more limited for measures in rail, ship and air transport.
A further step started in the previous period and completed during this period was the preparation of the four models (ASTRA, MARS, POLES, Tremove) that have been applied in GHG-TRANSPORD for the integrated scenario assessment. This concerned the implementation of the EU Common Reference Scenario developed from PRIMES, POLES and EC DG ECFIN inputs, the implementation of the policy measures for the scenarios and the extension of the models, to incorporate the learning curve approach for simulating cost pathways of measures in the models. In particular, the latter was applied to the ASTRA and POLES models.
A third activity was the scenario design that is undertaken by an iterative approach, such that first an initial set of scenarios was designed (e.g. maximum effect of efficiency technologies and market forces). Second, the impact of the scenario was compared to the reference scenario and gap to achieve at least 60 % GHG reductions was assessed as well as the transport and economic impacts. Taking these findings into account the scenarios were refined adding further GHG reduction measures to create a new set of scenarios and with them starting the next round of scenario testing - assessment - refinement. Finally, a set of six main scenarios was agreed to be tested with the ASTRA-POLES-MARS models and two additional scenarios to be tested with the TREMOVE model.
The fourth activity was to carry out the full set of final policy simulations and to analyse in detail the scenario results.
A fifth activity was run in parallel to develop a comprehensive assessment scheme to collect the outputs of the different models and assess the results in a structured way. The assessment scheme was conceived from the starting point of a theoretically comprehensive scheme, in which all relevant indicators would be provided by the assessment tools. In a second step, the scheme was reduced to compromise between the capabilities of the models and the requirements of an integrated assessment of the applied research and transport policies.
The sixth main activity of GHG-TRANSPORD was to continue the communication with stakeholders and the dissemination of findings of GHG-TRANSPORD. For this purpose, the website was regularly updated with deliverables and information about events organised by GHG-TRANSPORD. During this period, GHG-TRANSPORD organised two workshops and the final conference all located in Brussels to attract policy-makers, industry and scientists. In particular, the final conference organised jointly with the European Economics and Social Committee (EESC) turned out to be a very interesting and successful event. Further, GHG-TRANSPORD kept contact to the REACT and TOSCA projects by inviting them to the project workshops and offering them an opportunity to present their results. As an input to the workshops the stake-holders received either draft versions of deliverables (e.g. D3) of GHG-TRANSPORD or specific input notes describing and summarising the activities to be discussed at the workshop.
Potential impact:
The final output of the GHG-TRANSPORD project is a suggestion of an integrated strategy for the EU to reduce GHG emission of transport by at least 60 % until 2050 compared to 1990.
The GHG-TransPoRD project contributes to the overarching EU goal of limiting climate change to 2 degrees Celsius warming compared to pre-industrial levels and the main impact will thus be to support the climate policy objective with an aligned transport policy R&D strategy.
The systemic nature of the problem requires at least a European approach since inter-action and competition between modes occurs to large extent on the pan-European flows, and considering and introducing new technologies requires either an EU view or even a global view, since some of the technology options (e.g. hydrogen) could only be successful if introduced on such a large scale. The second aspect, here, is that such large scale changes also need a critical mass to start, which then requires communication between stakeholders. This is a further area in which GHG-TRANSPORD contributed to European policy-making as it brought together various stakeholders from different domains (e.g. industry, policy-makers, scientific community and citizens) at its workshops, interviews, and the final conference and made them talk to and discuss with each other.
List of websites: http://www.ghg-transpord.eu
Transport currently contributes about 27 % of the total European Union (EU) greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In a trend scenario, this share is expected to grow due to continued strong growth of transport demand, in particular of freight transport and air passenger trans-port, and slower efficiency improvements than for other GHG emitting sectors (EC DGTREN, European Energy and Transport: Trends to 2030 - update 2007, 2008).
Given the overall EU GHG reduction targets of 20 % until 2020 compared with the emission levels of 1990, or 30% if an international agreement is achieved, and of 60 to 80 % until 2050 (even -95 % is debated), it is obvious that in the future:
(1) the transport sector will have to contribute to GHG emission reductions such that
(2) reduction targets for the different transport modes have to be anticipated and
(3) aligned research strategies and transport policies have to be developed to efficiently and effectively meet these reduction targets for the medium to long term.
The GHG-TRANSPORD project aims at developing an integrated European strategy that links research and development (R&D) efforts with other transport policies and technological measures to achieve substantial GHG emission reductions in transport that are in line with the overall reduction targets of the EU. As part of this strategy, the project will propose GHG reduction targets for transport as a whole as well as for each transport mode for 2020 and 2050.
Project results:
The first activity completed in this reporting period, finalised an activity already started in the previous period. It concerned for the short listed promising measures to reduce GHG emissions of transport to assess the cost of each measure without considering the interrelationships between different measures. At this stage, it is important to analyse two elements of the cost:
(1) the additional cost of a measure today or at that point of time in the future when it will become available and introduced at the market; and
(2) the cost development over time as R&D, learning-by-doing and learning-by-using usually will enable to drive down the cost of new technologies or new processes.
In this period the analytical framework prepared in the previous reporting period was applied to measures in all modes and for alternative fuels. It turned out that the framework could be applied in a sophisticated manner for road transport and alternative fuels, while due to lack of studies or data application was more limited for measures in rail, ship and air transport.
A further step started in the previous period and completed during this period was the preparation of the four models (ASTRA, MARS, POLES, Tremove) that have been applied in GHG-TRANSPORD for the integrated scenario assessment. This concerned the implementation of the EU Common Reference Scenario developed from PRIMES, POLES and EC DG ECFIN inputs, the implementation of the policy measures for the scenarios and the extension of the models, to incorporate the learning curve approach for simulating cost pathways of measures in the models. In particular, the latter was applied to the ASTRA and POLES models.
A third activity was the scenario design that is undertaken by an iterative approach, such that first an initial set of scenarios was designed (e.g. maximum effect of efficiency technologies and market forces). Second, the impact of the scenario was compared to the reference scenario and gap to achieve at least 60 % GHG reductions was assessed as well as the transport and economic impacts. Taking these findings into account the scenarios were refined adding further GHG reduction measures to create a new set of scenarios and with them starting the next round of scenario testing - assessment - refinement. Finally, a set of six main scenarios was agreed to be tested with the ASTRA-POLES-MARS models and two additional scenarios to be tested with the TREMOVE model.
The fourth activity was to carry out the full set of final policy simulations and to analyse in detail the scenario results.
A fifth activity was run in parallel to develop a comprehensive assessment scheme to collect the outputs of the different models and assess the results in a structured way. The assessment scheme was conceived from the starting point of a theoretically comprehensive scheme, in which all relevant indicators would be provided by the assessment tools. In a second step, the scheme was reduced to compromise between the capabilities of the models and the requirements of an integrated assessment of the applied research and transport policies.
The sixth main activity of GHG-TRANSPORD was to continue the communication with stakeholders and the dissemination of findings of GHG-TRANSPORD. For this purpose, the website was regularly updated with deliverables and information about events organised by GHG-TRANSPORD. During this period, GHG-TRANSPORD organised two workshops and the final conference all located in Brussels to attract policy-makers, industry and scientists. In particular, the final conference organised jointly with the European Economics and Social Committee (EESC) turned out to be a very interesting and successful event. Further, GHG-TRANSPORD kept contact to the REACT and TOSCA projects by inviting them to the project workshops and offering them an opportunity to present their results. As an input to the workshops the stake-holders received either draft versions of deliverables (e.g. D3) of GHG-TRANSPORD or specific input notes describing and summarising the activities to be discussed at the workshop.
Potential impact:
The final output of the GHG-TRANSPORD project is a suggestion of an integrated strategy for the EU to reduce GHG emission of transport by at least 60 % until 2050 compared to 1990.
The GHG-TransPoRD project contributes to the overarching EU goal of limiting climate change to 2 degrees Celsius warming compared to pre-industrial levels and the main impact will thus be to support the climate policy objective with an aligned transport policy R&D strategy.
The systemic nature of the problem requires at least a European approach since inter-action and competition between modes occurs to large extent on the pan-European flows, and considering and introducing new technologies requires either an EU view or even a global view, since some of the technology options (e.g. hydrogen) could only be successful if introduced on such a large scale. The second aspect, here, is that such large scale changes also need a critical mass to start, which then requires communication between stakeholders. This is a further area in which GHG-TRANSPORD contributed to European policy-making as it brought together various stakeholders from different domains (e.g. industry, policy-makers, scientific community and citizens) at its workshops, interviews, and the final conference and made them talk to and discuss with each other.
List of websites: http://www.ghg-transpord.eu