Scenario analysis on alternative fuel/vehicle for China’s future road transport: Life-cycle energy demand and GHG emissions

The rapid growth of vehicles has resulted in continuing growth in China’s oil demand. This paper analyzes future trends of both direct and life cycle energy demand (ED) and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in China’s road transport sector, and assesses the effectiveness of possible reduction measures by using alternative vehicles/fuels. A model is developed to derive a historical trend and to project future trends. The government is assumed to do nothing additional in the future to influence the long-term trends in the business as usual (BAU) scenario. Four specific scenarios are used to describe the future cases where different alternative fuel/vehicles are applied. The best case scenario is set to represent the most optimized case. Direct ED and GHG emissions would reach 734 million tonnes of oil equivalent and 2384 million tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent by 2050 in the BAU case, respectively, more than 5.6 times of 2007 levels. Compared with the BAU case, the relative reductions achieved in the best case would be 15.8% and 27.6% for life cycle ED and GHG emissions, respectively. It is suggested for future policy implementation to support sustainable biofuel and high efficient electric-vehicles, and the deployment of coal-based fuels accompanied with low-carbon technology.     

Oil consumption and CO2 emissions in China's road transport: current status,future trends,and policy implications

With the rapid economic growth in China, the Chinese road transport system is becoming one of the largest and most rapidly growing oil consumers in China. This paper attempts to present the current status and forecast the future trends of oil demand and CO₂ emissions from the Chinese road transport sector and to explore possible policy measures to contain the explosive growth of Chinese transport oil consumption. A bottom-up model was developed to estimate the historical oil consumption and CO₂ emissions from China's road transport sector between 1997 and 2002 and to forecast future trends in oil consumption and CO₂ emissions up to 2030. To explore the importance of policy options of containing the dramatic growth in Chinese transport oil demand, three scenarios regarding motor vehicle fuel economy improvements were designed in predicting future oil use and CO₂ emissions. We conclude that China's road transportation will gradually become the largest oil consumer in China in the next two decades but that improvements in vehicle fuel economy have potentially large oil-saving benefits. In particular, if no control measures are implemented, the annual oil demand by China's road vehicles will reach 363 million tons by 2030. On the other hand, under the low- and high-fuel economy improvement scenarios, 55 and 85 million tons of oil will be saved in 2030, respectively. The scenario analysis suggests that China needs to implement vehicle fuel economy improvement measures immediately in order to contain the dramatic growth in transport oil consumption. The imminent implementation is required because (1) China is now in a period of very rapid growth in motor vehicle sales; (2) Chinese vehicles currently in the market are relatively inefficient; and (3) the turnover of a fleet of inefficient motor vehicles will take a long time.     

Evaluating the effectiveness of urban energy conservation and GHG mitigation measures: The case of Xiamen city,China

To assess the effectiveness of urban energy conservation and GHG mitigation measures, a detailed Long-range Energy Alternatives Planning (LEAP) model is developed and applied to analyze the future trends of energy demand and GHG emissions in Xiamen city. Two scenarios have been designed to describe the future energy strategies in relation to the development of Xiamen city. The ‘Business as Usual’ scenario assumes that the government will do nothing to influence the long-term trends of urban energy demand. An ‘Integrated’ scenario, on the other hand, is generated to assess the cumulative impact of a series of available reduction measures: clean energy substitution, industrial energy conservation, combined heat and power generation, energy conservation in building, motor vehicle control, and new and renewable energy development and utilization. The reduction potentials in energy consumption and GHG emissions are estimated for a time span of 2007–2020 under these different scenarios. The calculation results in Xiamen show that the clean energy substitution measure is the most effective in terms of energy saving and GHG emissions mitigation, while the industrial sector has the largest abatement potential.     

Energy demand and emissions from road transportation vehicles in China

Rapidly growing energy demand and emissions from China's road transportation vehicles in the last two decades have raised concerns over oil security, urban air pollution and global warming. This rapid growth will be likely to continue in the next two to three decades as the vehicle ownership level in China is still very low. The current status of China's road transport sector in terms of vehicles, infrastructure, energy use and emissions is presented. Mitigation measures implemented and those that can reasonably be expected to be adopted in the near future are analysed. Recent studies exploring the future trends of road vehicle energy demand and emissions under various strategies are reviewed. Moreover, those studies which assessed various fuel/propulsion options in China from a life cycle perspective are examined to present an overview of the potential for reducing energy use and emissions. Recommendations for further developments are also made. It is concluded that comprehensive and appropriate strategies will be needed to minimise the adverse impacts of China's road vehicles on energy resources and the environment. Fortunately, China appears to be heading in this direction.     

Hybrid modeling of China’s vehicle ownership and projection through 2050

As representative for emerging vehicle market, China has one of the fastest growing rates of automobile ownership in the world. The huge and increasing vehicle stock has significantly contributed to the fast growing of China’s energy demand and GHG emissions. It is an important issue to project China’s vehicle ownership, which to a large extent determines China’s oil demand and GHG emissions from road transportation sector in the future. In this study, we established a hybrid model with three sub models to simulate the growth patterns of China’s private passenger vehicles, urban public transport vehicles and economic utility vehicles. By using this model, we projected that China’s vehicle population would reach 184.8, 363.8 and 606.7 million by 2020, 2030 and 2050 respectively. The fast increase of urban private passenger vehicles is the main driving force for vehicle population growth. Population of urban private passenger vehicles would account for 70.1%, 81.1% and 86.1% of total vehicle population in 2020, 2030 and 2050 respectively. It was demonstrated by sensitivity analysis that vehicle population was quite sensitive to household income and vehicle price, implying an effective lever for regulating the growth of vehicle population.     

Estimation on oil demand and oil saving potential of China's road transport sector

China is currently in the stage of industrialization and urbanization, which is characterized by rigid energy demand and rapid growth of energy consumption. Therefore, energy conservation will become a major strategy for China in a transition to low-carbon economy. China's transport industry is of high energy consumption. In 2010, oil consumption in transport industry takes up 38.2% of the country's total oil demand, of which 23.6% is taken up by road transport sector. As a result, oil saving in China's road transport sector is vital to the whole nation. The co-integration method is developed to find a long-run relationship between oil consumption and affecting factors such as GDP, road condition, labor productivity and oil price, to estimate oil demand and to predict future oil saving potential in China's transport sector under different oil-saving scenarios. Monte Carlo simulation is further used for risk analysis. Results show that under BAU condition, oil demand of China's road transport sector will reach 278.5 million ton of oil equivalents (MTOE) in 2020. Oil saving potential will be 86 MTOE and 131 MTOE under moderate oil-saving scenario and advanced oil-saving scenario, respectively. This paper provides a reference to establishing oil saving policy for China's road transport sector.     

Potential impact of transition to a low-carbon transport system in Iceland

This paper develops a system dynamics model of Iceland׳s energy sector (UniSyD_IS) that is based on the UniSyD_NZ model of New Zealand׳s energy economy. The model focuses on the energy supply sector with endogenous representation of road transport energy demand. Equilibrium interactions are performed across electricity, hydrogen, biofuels, and road transport sectors. Possible transition paths toward a low-carbon transport in Iceland are explored with implications for fuel demand, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and associated costs. The consumer sector simulates the long-term evolution of light and heavy-duty vehicles through a vehicle choice algorithm that accounts for social influences and consumer preferences. Through different scenarios, the influences of four fundamental driving factors are examined. The factors are oil price, carbon tax, fuel supply-push, and government incentives. The results show that changes in travel demand, vehicle technologies, fuel types, and efficiency improvements can support feasible transition paths to achieve sufficient reduction in GHG for both 4 °C and 2 °C climate scenarios of the Nordic Energy Technology Perspectives study. Initial investment in supply infrastructure for alternative fuels will not only mitigate GHG emissions, but also could provide long-term economic benefits through fuel cost saving for consumers and reduced fuel import costs for government.     

Analysis on the carbon trading approach in promoting sustainable buildings in China

With the high growth urbanization and increasing new urban population, the huge demand for infrastructures and dwellings has become a great challenge for the sustainable development in Chinese cities. The building sector shares one fourth of total energy consumption in the country and plays an important role in reducing the energy consumption and the consequential green house gas (GHG) emissions. Some policies have been issued for promoting the low carbon sustainable development in China's buildings. However, existing barriers especially the investment barriers substantially prevent the low carbon technologies and service from being employed effectively. The carbon trading scheme of cap-and-trade is now widely accepted as one cost-effective way to deal with the climate change issue in the world, and it can be utilized for overcoming the barriers to carbon reduction activities in China's building sector. A new Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) energy performance based method is designed for reducing transaction costs in implementing CDM projects in China's buildings before 2020. And then a “step by step” approach is formed to establish the domestic and international carbon trading mechanism to effectively reduce GHG missions in China's building sector after 2020.     

Transport demand,harmful emissions,environment and health co-benefits in China

The Chinese residents' travel demand has been increasing dramatically. As a result, emissions from motor vehicles have been found as one main source of air pollution in China, which consequently influences the residents' health. To better understand the environmental deterioration and health losses caused by the transport sector in China, in current circumstances, one must know how the changes in residents' travel demand and alternative transport modes affect environment and health co-benefits in China. We first of all calculate the demand from nearly all the residents' travel means, including road, rail, water, and air transport. Besides, based on the results, this paper further makes projections for a business-as-usual scenario for 2050 with several alternative transport scenarios to reduce harmful emissions and improve the welfare of the residents' health in China. Our integrated framework includes the harmful emissions models, the fixed box model and the exposure-response models, to link transport demand with possible environmental and health outcomes. The findings suggest that significant environment and health co-benefits are possible if alternative transport replaces. This research, to the best of our knowledge, is the first attempt to estimate the total resident's travel demand under different scenarios and the consequent environment and health co-benefits in the transitional China.     

Comparative assessment of future motor vehicles under various climate change mitigation scenarios

The aim of comparative assessment of future road transport technologies is to find the cheapest motor vehicles in terms of private and external Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emission costs under various international climate change mitigation scenarios in 2020 and 2050. The comparative assessment of the main road transport technologies ranging from conventional vehicles to hybrid electric vehicles was performed. The main indicators for comparative future motor vehicles assessment are: private costs and life cycle external costs of GHG emissions. The obtained ranking of road transport technologies allows to identify the most perspective future motor vehicles taking into account international climate change mitigation constraints and to promote these road technologies by policy tools. The cheapest road transport technologies in 2020 and 2050 are: the main results presented in this paper were obtained during EU financed Framework 7 project “PLANETS” dealing with probabilistic long-term assessment of new energy technology scenarios.     

China on the move: Oil price explosion?

Rapid expansion of highway and jet traffic in China has created a surge of demand for oil products, putting pressure on world energy markets and petroleum product prices. This paper examines trends in freight and passenger traffic to assess how growth in China's transport demand relates to growth in China's economy, as well as the energy intensity of transport. Based on assumptions about demand elasticity and energy intensity, a range of scenarios is developed for China's oil demand through 2020. Incremental oil demand from China's transport sector is then compared with world oil demand projections to assess the likely impact on world oil prices. The finding is that new demand from China's transport sector would likely raise world oil prices in 2020 by 1–3% in reference scenarios or by 3–10% if oil supply investment is constrained.     

China's transportation energy consumption and CO2 emissions from a global perspective

Rapidly growing energy demand from China's transportation sector in the last two decades have raised concerns over national energy security, local air pollution, and carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions, and there is broad consensus that China's transportation sector will continue to grow in the coming decades. This paper explores the future development of China's transportation sector in terms of service demands, final energy consumption, and CO₂ emissions, and their interactions with global climate policy. This study develops a detailed China transportation energy model that is nested in an integrated assessment model—Global Change Assessment Model (GCAM)—to evaluate the long-term energy consumption and CO₂ emissions of China's transportation sector from a global perspective. The analysis suggests that, without major policy intervention, future transportation energy consumption and CO₂ emissions will continue to rapidly increase and the transportation sector will remain heavily reliant on fossil fuels. Although carbon price policies may significantly reduce the sector's energy consumption and CO₂ emissions, the associated changes in service demands and modal split will be modest, particularly in the passenger transport sector. The analysis also suggests that it is more difficult to decarbonize the transportation sector than other sectors of the economy, primarily owing to its heavy reliance on petroleum products.     

Cost of a potential hydrogen-refueling network for heavy-duty vehicles with long-haul application in Germany 2050

Long-distance road-freight transport emits a large share of Germany's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A potential solution for reducing GHG emissions in this sector is to use green hydrogen in fuel cell electric vehicles (FC-HDV) and establish an accompanying hydrogen refueling station (HRS) network. In this paper, we apply an existing refueling network design model to a HDV-HRS network for Germany until 2050 based on German traffic data for heavy-duty trucks and estimate its costs. Comparing different fuel supply scenarios (pipeline vs. on-site), The on-site scenario results show a network consisting of 137 stations at a cost of 8.38 billion € per year in 2050 (0.40 € per vehicle km), while the centralized scenario with the same amount of stations shows a cheaper cost with 7.25 billion euros per year (0.35 € per vehicle km). The hydrogen cost (LCOH) varies from 5.59 €/kg (pipeline) to 6.47 €/kg (on-site) in 2050.     

基于LEAP模型的广州交通领域能耗及空气污染物排放分析

基于长期能源替代规划系统(LEAP)模型,结合情景分析法,模拟广州交通领域未来的能耗及CO、HC、NOx、PM2.5、SO2等主要空气污染物排放趋势,分析广州交通领域的节能及空气污染物排放控制策略.结果表明:综合情景下,到2035年,广州交通领域将较基准情景节能23.06％,CO、HC、NOx、PM2.5、SO2分别减...     

Life-cycle greenhouse gas analysis of LNG as a heavy vehicle fuel in Europe

The aim of the present study was to compare the life cycle, in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, of diesel and liquefied natural gas (LNG) used as fuels for heavy-duty vehicles in the European market (EU-15). A literature review revealed that the numerous studies conducted have reported different results when the authors departed from different baseline assumptions and reference scenarios. For our study, we concentrated on the European scenario and on heavy-duty road transport vehicles, given their important incidence on the global emissions of GHG. Two possible LNG procurement strategies were considered i.e. purchasing it directly from the regasification terminal (LNG-TER) or producing LNG locally (at the service station) with small-scale plants (LNG-SSL). We ascertained that the use of LNG-TER enables a 10% reduction in GHG emissions by comparison with diesel, while the emissions resulting from the LNG-SSL solution are comparable with those of diesel.     

Fuel conservation and GHG (Greenhouse gas) emissions mitigation scenarios for China’s passenger vehicle fleet

Passenger vehicles are the main consumers of gasoline in China. We established a bottom-up model which focuses on the simulation of energy consumptions and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions growth by China’s passenger vehicle fleet. The fuel conservation and GHG emissions mitigation effects of five measures including constraining vehicle registration, reducing vehicle travel, strengthening fuel consumption rate (FCR) limits, vehicle downsizing and promoting electric vehicle (EV) penetration were evaluated. Based on the combination of these measures, the fuel conservation and GHG emissions mitigation scenarios for China’s passenger vehicle fleet were analyzed. Under reference scenario with no measures implemented, the fuel consumptions and life cycle GHG emissions will reach 520 million tons of oil equivalent (Mtoe) and 2.15 billion tons in 2050, about 8.1 times the level in 2010. However, substantial fuel conservation can be achieved by implementing the measures. By implementing all five measures together, the fuel consumption will reach 138 Mtoe in 2030 and decrease to 126 Mtoe in 2050, which is only 37.1% and 24.3% of the consumption under reference scenario. Similar potential lies in GHG mitigation. The results and scenarios provided references for the Chinese government’s policy-making.     

Pathways to Mexico’s climate change mitigation targets: A multi-model analysis

Mexico’s climate policy sets ambitious national greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction targets—30% versus a business-as-usual baseline by 2020, 50% versus 2000 by 2050. However, these goals are at odds with recent energy and emission trends in the country. Both energy use and GHG emissions in Mexico have grown substantially over the last two decades. We investigate how Mexico might reverse current trends and reach its mitigation targets by exploring results from energy system and economic models involved in the CLIMACAP-LAMP project. To meet Mexico’s emission reduction targets, all modeling groups agree that decarbonization of electricity is needed, along with changes in the transport sector, either to more efficient vehicles or a combination of more efficient vehicles and lower carbon fuels. These measures reduce GHG emissions as well as emissions of other air pollutants. The models find different energy supply pathways, with some solutions based on renewable energy and others relying on biomass or fossil fuels with carbon capture and storage. The economy-wide costs of deep mitigation could range from 2% to 4% of GDP in 2030, and from 7% to 15% of GDP in 2050. Our results suggest that Mexico has some flexibility in designing deep mitigation strategies, and that technological options could allow Mexico to achieve its emission reduction targets, albeit at a cost to the country.     

Strategies for a road transport system based on renewable resources – The case of an import-independent Sweden in 2025

When discussing how society can decrease greenhouse gas emissions, the transport sector is often seen as posing one of the most difficult problems. In addition, the transport sector faces problems related to security of supply. The aim of this paper is to present possible strategies for a road transport system based on renewable energy sources and to illustrate how such a system could be designed to avoid dependency on imports, using Sweden as an example. The demand-side strategies considered include measures for decreasing the demand for transport, as well as various technical and non-technical means of improving vehicle fuel economy. On the supply side, biofuels and synthetic fuels produced from renewable electricity are discussed. Calculations are performed to ascertain the possible impact of these measures on the future Swedish road transport sector. The results underline the importance of powerful demand-side measures and show that although biofuels can certainly contribute significantly to an import-independent road transport sector, they are far from enough even in a biomass-rich country like Sweden. Instead, according to this study, fuels based on renewable electricity will have to cover more than half of the road transport sector’s energy demand.     

Energy efficiency achievements in China׳s industrial and transport sectors: How do they rate?

China is experiencing intensified industrialisation and motorisation. In the world׳s largest emerging economy, energy efficiency is expected to play a critical role in the ever-rising demand for energy. Based on factual overviews and numerical analysis, this article carries out an in-depth investigation into the effectiveness of policies announced or implemented in recent decades targeted at energy conservation in the energy intensive manufacturing and transportation sectors. It highlights nine energy intensive sectors that achieved major improvements in their energy technology efficiency efforts. Under the umbrella of the 11th Five-Year Plan, these sectors׳ performances reflect the effectiveness of China׳s energy conservation governance. Numerous actions have been taken in China to reduce the road transport sector׳s demand for energy and its GHG emissions by implementing fuel economy standards, promoting advanced energy efficient vehicles, and alternative fuels.Coal-based energy saving technologies, especially industrial furnace technologies, are critical for China׳s near and medium-term energy saving. In the long run, renewable energy development and expanding the railway transport system are the most effective ways to reduce energy use and GHG emissions in China. Fuel economy standards could reduce oil consumption and GHGs by 34–35 per cent.     

Exploring the potential of hydrogen in decarbonizing China's light-duty vehicle market

The Chinese government has pledged to achieve overall carbon neutrality by 2060. Currently, the transportation sector contributes to about 10% of total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in China. Hence, China has created a well-defined energy vehicle development strategy to reduce GHG emissions from the transportation sector, further expanding into hydrogen vehicle technologies. In this study, the Transportation Energy Analysis Model (TEAM) investigates the potential of hydrogen internal combustion engine vehicles (H₂-ICEVs) and fuel cell vehicles (FCEVs) as a reliable pathway towards the government's aspiration of carbon neutrality in the transportation sector. According to TEAM, by adopting FCEVs and H₂-ICEVs in the vehicle market, hydrogen demand could reach 25% of the total light-duty transportation energy demand in 2050. Consequently, this will lead to an annual reduction of more than 35 million tons GHG compared to only counting on the electrification pathway in the decarbonization task. Besides, FCEVs would take longer to penetrate the light-duty vehicle market compared to H₂-ICEVs, as the current fuel cell technology still requires much improvement to attain a competitive vehicle cost of production.