Background Guide:

Carbon-neutral Transport

In cooperation with: Funded by: Horizon 2020 A project by:

Toulouse, France

07 - 09 July 2018

Final European Student Parliament

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Carbon-neutral Transport

Preface

Honourable delegates,

We warmly welcome you to the European Student Parliament. At this year’s conference the

topic will be the future of mobility. Mobility in a globalised world is not only important for

urban planning, but also for communication, economics, finance and many other sectors.

In the following handbook we will give you an overview of one of the five sub-topics which

will be discussed in Toulouse: Carbon-neutral Transport

Climate change as a result of global warming is a serious challenge for our and for upcoming

generations. One of the main causes of climate change is the increased greenhouse effect

caused by human activities that emit greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide and methane.

76 per cent of the global greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activities are carbon

dioxide which is released by deforestation, other land use changes, burning fossil fuels and

industrial processes. Transport generates almost a quarter of Europe’s greenhouse gas

emissions, with road transport responsible for more than 70 per cent of emissions in the

sector. It is our responsibility to protect Earth’s climate and environment for future

generations, to understand the causes of climate change, and to take action to prevent further

climate change and mitigate the effects of unavoidable climate change.

At the European Students Parliament we want to discuss the opportunities and challenges of

carbon-neutral transport in the context of mobility in a concrete way. Questions that could

provide a starting point for your discussions can be found in chapter number six of this

handbook. Your discussions both with your committee and during the expert hearing will be

the foundation for the resolutions that you will write to suggest European and global

guidelines for carbon-neutral transport.

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Table of Contents

Preface ........................................................................................................................................ 1

1 Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Transport ............................................................................ 3

2 Electric Vehicles ..................................................................................................................... 5

2.1 Types of Vehicles ............................................................................................................. 5

2.2 Environmental Footprint .................................................................................................. 6

2.3 Uptake and Infrastructure ................................................................................................. 8

3 Hydrogen Vehicles .................................................................................................................. 8

4 Biofuels ................................................................................................................................. 10

5 Transport Efficiency .............................................................................................................. 11

6 Guiding Questions ................................................................................................................. 11

7 Further Reading ..................................................................................................................... 12

8 Bibliography .......................................................................................................................... 12

Figure 1: A European Strategy for low-emission mobility, European Commission, 2018a. ..... 3

Figure 2: Climate Change – driving forces, European Commission, 2018b. ............................. 3

Figure 3: EEU (KP) - Share of transport GHG emissions, European Environment Agency,

2015a. ......................................................................................................................................... 4

Figure 4: Road transport – Share of transport GHG emission, European Environment Agency,

2017. ........................................................................................................................................... 5

Figure 5: Range of life-cycle CO2 emissions for different vehicle and fuel types, European

Environment Agency, 2017b. ..................................................................................................... 7

Figure 6: Scheme of a proton-conducting fuel cell, Dervisoglu, 2012. ..................................... 9

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1 Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Transport

The EU has already reached its target for greenhouse gas emissions for 2020: a reduction of

20% compared to 1990 levels. To reach the target of a 40% reduction by 2030, this trend must

be strengthened.

Figure 1: A European Strategy for low-emission mobility, European Commission, 2018a.

* Transport includes aviation but not international maritime transport

**Other includes fugitive and indirect emissions In recent years most sectors have reduced their emissions, but transport is an exception. It is

the only sector that currently emits more greenhouse gases than it did in 1990 (European

Commission 2018a).

Figure 2: Climate Change – driving forces, European Commission, 2018b.

Sectors like energy production (electricity and heating) and manufacturing have managed to

reduce emissions while maintaining or increasing production. Transport has not achieved this

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decoupling. For transport the volume of emissions correlates with the volume transported

(number of passengers or tonnes of goods). One reason for this is that transport has not

improved its fuel efficiency significantly. Another reason is that transport has not increased its

share of renewables or less-polluting fuels. While heat and electricity production have moved

from coal to gas and increased their share of renewables, transport has failed to make this

change (European Commission 2018b).

Figure 3: EEU (KP) - Share of transport GHG emissions, European Environment Agency, 2015a.

Road transportation is by far the biggest emitter of greenhouse gases in the transport sector,

followed by aviation and maritime transport. Emissions from international aviation have

increased most over the period 1990 – 2014. On the road the main producer of greenhouse gas

emissions is cars (European Environment Agency 2015a).

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Figure 4: Road transport – Share of transport GHG emission, European Environment Agency, 2017.

2 Electric Vehicles

2.1 Types of Vehicles

Most electric vehicles are cars. Electric vans are not yet widely available although some

models are on offer. Electricity is less suitable for heavy trucks because the batteries required

for their weight become very heavy. Electric buses, on the other hand, are being used or tested

in multiple European cities.

Electric vehicles use the following components:

An electric motor which powers the vehicle and may also generate energy when the

vehicle slows down. Electric motor technology is quite mature.

A battery that stores energy. Lithium-ion batteries are the most common. Battery

technology continues to improve in terms of the amount of energy that can be stored

(which affects how far the vehicles can travel before being charged) and the speed

with which they can deliver and absorb charge (which affects the time needed to

recharge the batteries).

A controller that regulates how much power the motor can take from the batteries

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Regenerative brakes that put some of the energy from braking back into the battery.

They are used together with conventional friction brakes (European Environment

Agency 2016: 11-13).

There are several different types of vehicles which use electricity for some or all of their

power:

Battery electric vehicles are driven by an electric motor powered by a battery. They

are the most efficient of the electric vehicles and produce no exhaust gases. Their

driving range is 80 – 400 km.

Hybrid electric vehicles are predominantly powered by their internal combustion

engines, but use an electric motor to assist the engine and increase fuel efficiency.

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles have both an electric motor and an internal-

combustion engine which can work together or separately. The electric driving range

is 20 – 85 km and the combustion engine is used for longer trips.

Battery and plug-in-hybrid electric vehicles can use fast and slow charging cycles, depending

on the available power supply. The current standard for motorways is around 30 minutes

while most public charging poles require 1 – 2 hours. The slowest charging mode for

household use without three-phase power takes 6 – 8 hours.

Plug-in charging is more common than wireless charging which charges vehicles parked over

a charging pad via an electromagnetic field. Wireless charging is mostly being trialled for

buses, but also cars (European Environment Agency 2016: 17-21).

2.2 Environmental Footprint

The climate footprint of battery electric vehicles depends on their source of electricity. If the

electricity comes from renewable sources, they are emissions free. With the current mix of

electricity sources in Europe they already produce fewer emissions than combustion engines.

Their lifecycle emissions are lowest when they are powered by renewable electricity.

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Figure 5: Range of life-cycle CO2 emissions for different vehicle and fuel types, European Environment Agency, 2017b.

Another aspect of the environmental impact of electric cars is the production and recycling of

batteries. Life-cycle analyses suggest that the batteries are less important to the environmental

impact of an electric vehicle than its source of electricity (European Environment Agency

2017b).

The most common type of battery in electric cars is the lithium-ion battery. The main

components of these batteries are lithium, graphite, nickel and cobalt as well as aluminium

and copper. Lithium is mostly mined from brines which cause relatively little environmental

damage compared to other mining processes. Cobalt is considered to be a risk to the supply

chain for batteries, mainly because of where it is mined and refined. The main producer is the

Democratic Republic of Congo (where the political situation is unstable) and most refining is

done in China (which has previously restricted supplies of minerals for export).

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Recycling lithium-ion batteries offers an opportunity to recover the metals and reduce demand

for mining. While it is technically possible to recycle the batteries, currently less than 1 per

cent of lithium is recycled (McLellan 2017).

2.3 Uptake and Infrastructure

In 2015 about 1 in every 700 cars in Europe was electric. While sales are increasing, they still

made up only 1∙2 per cent of new car sales in the EU in 2015. Consumer criticisms of electric

vehicles include the driving range (suitable for local trips but not over many hundreds of

kilometres), higher purchase costs (offset in some countries by subsidies) and limited

charging points (European Environment Agency 2016: 46):

There is no EU-wide target for charging points, but member states must produce national

action plans by 2020. Many European countries currently have only a few thousand public

charging points. The Netherlands led with 23 000 public charging points in 2016, while four

countries had fewer than 40 (European Environment Agency 2016: 34).

Local governments support electric vehicle use with a range of strategies including using

electric fleet cars, providing electric cars with free parking or charging stations, or allowing

access to restricted areas like bus lanes or city centres (European Environment Agency 2016:

67)

3 Hydrogen Vehicles

Fuel-cell electric vehicles use an electric motor, but rather than having a battery they are

powered by hydrogen fuel cells. They have a driving range of 160 – 500 km and can refuel

quickly. The fuel cells are heavy and suited to medium to large vehicles. Several pilot projects

for hydrogen cars and buses have been carried out in Europe. Trials have included installing

hydrogen refuelling stations and running daily bus services.

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Figure 6: Scheme of a proton-conducting fuel cell, Dervisoglu, 2012.

Hydrogen fuel cells generate electricity from a chemical reaction between hydrogen and

oxygen to produce water. Hydrogen fuel must be provided, oxygen is sourced from the air,

and the “waste” product is water.

All fuel cells operate according to similar principles. Using a catalyst, hydrogen is stripped of

electrons at the anode. These travel through an electric circuit, providing energy. The protons

(hydrogen ions) combine with electrons and oxygen using another catalyst at the cathode to

create water. There are several varieties of fuel cell, but for vehicles the proton exchange

membrane is the most common type (Smithsonian National Museum for American History

2017).

The hydrogen required for fuel is produced either as a by-product of another chemical process

or by electrolysis from water. If electrolysis is fuelled by renewable energy sources,

producing the hydrogen does not create greenhouse gases. The fuel cells themselves generate

water as waste.

Hydrogen vehicles can refuel in a similar time to petrol or diesel vehicles and have a similar

driving range before they need to refuel. Currently their purchase and running costs are higher

than for petrol or diesel vehicles. The number of refuelling stations in Europe is limited and is

mostly concentrated in Western and Northern Europe. A joint venture of the EU aims to bring

the technology to market readiness by 2020 (European Commission 2018c)

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4 Biofuels

By 2020 the EU will derive 10 % of all transport fuel from renewable sources. To a large

extent this goal is being met using biofuels, especially ethanol and biodiesel. These can fully

or partially replace fossil fuels in combustion engines.

Theoretically, biofuels could be carbon neutral, since the growing plants absorb CO2 which is

then released when the biofuels are burnt. In practice energy is needed for planting, fertilising

and harvesting the plants. When measuring emissions savings it is also critical to consider the

entire lifecycle of biofuels, including indirect land use changes (e.g. clearing of swamps or

forest to plant oil palms), loss of soil carbon or additional fertiliser use. Some second

generation biofuels address these environmental issues and produce significantly lower

greenhouse gas emissions than fossil fuels, for example emissions savings of 60 – 80 % are

possible from biofuels generated from agricultural and forestry waste (European Commission

2018d).

Biofuels are typically referred to as:

First generation biofuels – the fuel is produced from sugar, starch or oil derived from

a plant that is grown in competition with food crops

Second generation biofuels – the fuel is made from cellulosic (woody) biomass such

as agricultural and forestry waste (e.g. stubble or sawdust) or non-food crops.

Third generation biofuels – the fuel is produced from algae (European Technology

and Innovation Platform 2018).

In response to criticism of its Renewable Energy Directive, which sets the 10 % goal for

renewable fuels, the European Commission introduced sustainability criteria for biofuels.

These set minimum greenhouse gas savings compared with fossil fuels, does not allow

biofuels grown on land that was previously wetland or forest and does not allow raw materials

from primary forests or biodiverse grasslands. Critics call for stronger limits on food-based

biofuels and better accounting for emissions due to land-use change.

Waste, including used cooking oil, forestry slash, crop residues and municipal garbage, can be

used to produce second-generation biofuels. If all these sources were used to generate

transport fuels they could produce 16 % of the EU’s road fuel needs by 2030 (European

Climate Foundation 2015: 4-8).

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5 Transport Efficiency

This text has focused on alternative ways to power vehicles as a means of reducing the carbon

footprint of transport, particularly road transport. It would also be possible to reduce

emissions by improving transport efficiency through measure such as:

Rail transport – both passengers and goods can be moved efficiently using electric

trains, which can be emissions-free if powered by renewable energy. The two main

difficulties in expanding rail transport are the cost of expanding the rail network and

the “last mile” between the railway station or depot and the final destination. Good

connections to the final destination are critical to the uptake of rail transport.

Other electric vehicles – trams and o-buses are common in European cities. Electric

buses and even driverless electric minibuses are being trialled and introduced in cities

around Europe.

Mobility on demand – If private vehicles are replaced with mobility on demand, the

total number of vehicles needed in a city is dramatically reduced (less than a third of

the number of vehicles is needed). In this case every car is like a taxi and passengers

can collect a car (or if automation was standard, be collected by the car) when they

need to travel (European Commission 2018a),

6 Guiding Questions

How can we transport people and goods more efficiently?

How could alternatives like electric or hydrogen-powered vehicles reduce emissions?

Which alternatives fuels are more ready to implement in Europe?

What refill-infrastructure do we need to support new types of vehicles?

How can we ensure that fuel crops don’t compete with food crops, if bio-fuels are subsidised?

Can we produce biofuels from waste (agricultural, municipal or food)?

How can we speed up the transition to carbon-neutral transport?

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7 Further Reading

European Environment Agency (2017): EEA greenhouse gas - data viewer [Website]. Retrieved 28

February 2018 from: http://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/data/data-viewers/greenhouse-gases-

viewer.

European Federation for Transport and Environment (2018): Biofuels [Website]. Retrieved 28

February 2018 from: https://www.transportenvironment.org/what-we-do/biofuels.

TÜV SÜD Industrie Service GmbH (2018): Hydrogen Refuelling Stations Worldwide Hydrogen

Refuelling Stations Worldwide [Website]. Retrieved 28 February 2018 from:

https://www.netinform.de/H2/H2Stations/H2Stations.aspx?Continent=EU&StationID=-1.

8 Bibliography

Dervisoglu, R. (2012): Scheme of a proton-conducting fuel cell [Website]. Retrieved 28 February

2018 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell#/media/File:Solid_oxide_fuel_cell_protonic.svg.

European Climate Foundation (2015): Wasted. Europe’s untapped resource [Report]. Retrieved 27

February 2018 from: https://europeanclimate.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/WASTED-final.pdf.

European Commission (2018c): Hydrogen and fuels cells for transport [Website], Retireved 28

February 2018 from: https://ec.europa.eu/transport/themes/urban/vehicles/road/hydrogen_en.

European Commission (2018d): Biofuels [Website]. Retrieved 27 February 2018 from:

https://ec.europa.eu/energy/en/topics/renewable-energy/biofuels.

European Commission (2018a): A European strategy for low-emission mobility [Website]. Retrieved

28 February 2018 from: https://ec.europa.eu/clima/policies/transport_en.

European Commission (2018b): Climate change – driving forces [Website]. Retrieved 28 February

2018 from: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Climate_change_-

_driving_forces.

European Environment Agency (2017a): Road transport – Share of transport GHG emissions

[Website]. Retrieved 28 February 2018 from: https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/daviz/share-

of-transport-ghg-emissions#tab-googlechartid_chart_12.

European Environment Agency (2017b): Range of life-cycle CO2 emissions for different vehicle and

fuel types [Website]. Retrieved 28 February 2018 from: https://www.eea.europa.eu/signals/signals-

2017/infographics/range-of-life-cycle-co2/view.

European Environment Agency (2016): Electric Vehicles in Europe [Report]. European Environment

Agency, Copenhagen. Retrieved 28 February 2018 from:

https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/electric-vehicles-in-europe/download.

European Environment Agency (2015a): Share of transport GHG emissions [Website]. Retrieved 28

February 2018 from: https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/daviz/share-of-transport-ghg-

emissions#tab-chart_1.

European Environment Agency (2015b): Range of life-cycle CO2 emissions for different vehicle and

fuel types [Website]. Retrieved 28 February 2018 from: https://www.eea.europa.eu/signals/signals-

2017/infographics/range-of-life-cycle-co2/view.

European Technology and Innovation Platform (2018): Advanced Biofuels in Europe [Website].

Retrieved 27 February 2018 from:

http://www.etipbioenergy.eu/?option=com_content&view=article&id=287.

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McLellan, Ben (2017): Politically charged: Do you know where your batteries come from? Retrieved

28 February 2018 from: https://theconversation.com/politically-charged-do-you-know-where-your-

batteries-come-from-80886.

Smithsonian National Museum for American History (2017): Fuel Cell Basics [Website]. Retrieved 28

February 2018 from: http://americanhistory.si.edu/fuelcells/basics.htm.