5.4 Mitigation potential

As discussed earlier, under ‘business-as-usual’ conditions with assumed adequate supplies of petroleum, GHG emissions from transport are expected to grow steadily during the next few decades, yielding about an 80% increase from 2002–2030 or 2.1% per year. This growth will not be evenly distributed; IEA projections of annual CO₂ growth rates for 2002–2030 range from 1.3% for the OECD nations to 3.6% for the developing countries. The potential for reducing this growth will vary widely across countries and regions, as will the appropriate policies and measures that can accomplish such reduction.

Analyses of the potential for reducing GHG emissions in the transport sector are largely limited to national or sub-national studies or to examinations of technologies at the vehicle level, for example well-to-wheel analyses of alternative fuels and drive trains for light-duty vehicles. The TAR presented the results of several studies for the years 2010 and 2020 (Table 3.16 of the TAR), with virtually all limited to single countries or to the EU or OECD. Many of these studies indicated that substantial reductions in transport GHG emissions could be achieved at negative or minimal costs, although these results generally used optimistic assumptions about future technology costs and/or did not consider trade-offs between vehicle efficiency and other (valued) vehicle characteristics. Studies undertaken since the TAR have tended to reach conclusions generally in agreement with these earlier studies, though recent studies have focused more on transitions to hydrogen used in fuel cell vehicles.

This section will discuss some available studies and provide estimates of GHG emissions reduction potential and costs/tonne of carbon emissions reduced for a limited set of mitigation measures. These estimates do not properly reflect the wide range of measures available, many of which would likely be undertaken primarily to achieve goals other than GHG reduction (or saving energy), for example to provide mobility to the poor, reduce air pollution and traffic reduce congestion. The estimates do not include:

• Measures to reduce shipping emissions;
• Changes in urban structure that would reduce travel demand and enhance the use of mass transit, walking and bicycling;
• Transport demand management measures, including parking ‘cash out’, road pricing, inner city entry charges, etc.