Tag Archives for vehicles

The trucking industry has begun to turn electric — but passenger vehicles will take a little longer


Janus Electric

Gail Broadbent, UNSW and Graciela Metternicht, UNSWAustralia’s trucking industry is making moves to go electric. The latest development — a system for using swappable batteries instead of time-consuming recharge stations for long-haul trucks between Sydney and Brisbane — shows how this transition is gathering momentum.

There will be clear socio-economic, environmental and health-related benefits from the switch to electric trucks — for the broader community as well as for the trucking industry and truckies themselves. As electric vehicle researchers, we think swappable batteries could work well for trucking, but are perhaps less suitable for everyday electric cars.

Electric trucking

There are many benefits from electrifying truck transport. Companies such as Woolworths and Ikea have already started to transition to electric delivery vans for the environmental benefits (and a possible boost for their brands).

Many leading truck manufacturers such as Scania,
Mercedes Benz and Volvo are proceeding apace with trials and plans to make their trucks electric.

Trucks make up 20% of the vehicles in Australia, and Australia’s transport emissions are still growing.

Australia’s motor vehicles consume more than 33 billion litres of fuel each year. The transport sector was responsible for about 100 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions in 2019.

Australia spent some A$31 billion in 2019 to import oil, with half used for road transport. This not only affects Australia’s balance of trade, but poses a risk to our freight industry (including supermarket deliveries) if geopolitical instability affects fuel imports (which mainly come from just a few countries).

The trucking company Linfox appears to have understood the advantages that transition to electric trucks can bring to its business, and is one of the early adopters trialling them here in Australia.

Not just trucking companies

Many big companies are making commitments to cut their carbon emissions, such as Fortescue Metals’ target of net zero operational emissions by 2040. Its mining fleet operations account for half of its operational emissions.

Procurement of electric trucks by government and mining fleets could not only help reduce transport emissions but signal to the community that the transition away from more polluting vehicles can be done.



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Net-zero, carbon-neutral, carbon-negative … confused by all the carbon jargon? Then read this

Modernising the fleet is an imperative that we need to prioritise. The business sector can play a key role in the success of the latest Australia Government Technology Investment roadmap.

Innovative solutions such as the truck battery swap system mean that not only big companies but also sole operators can make the change, by converting existing trucks and leasing batteries.

A typical articulated truck uses 53.1 litres of diesel per 100 kilometres. A trip from Brisbane to Sydney could cost more than A$600 in fuel (which you, the consumer, help pay for when you purchase transported goods). Going electric would not only at least halve that cost but reduce maintenance costs and reduce emissions, even if batteries are recharged from the grid.



Read more:
Clean, green machines: the truth about electric vehicle emissions

Swap and go?

Swapping out depleted batteries, rather than stopping to recharge, is a great solution for trucks: they make regular trips along major routes with regulated rest stops for drivers, which means you only need battery-swapping stations at key points along the routes.

However, battery swapping for ordinary passenger vehicles may be a different story. It has been tried before, but didn’t take off.

A US-based company called Better Place, founded in 2007, got as far as setting up trial stations (with one even planned for Canberra). But the company collapsed in 2013.

One problem was that car manufacturers would have had to agree to use a common battery platform to enable swapping, and only Renault came on board. Another was that the cost of installing enough battery swap stations to satisfy the wider community was enormous.

Trucks travelling on major transport routes won’t face this problem, so battery-swapping has a better chance of success.

How to go electric

Our ongoing research on policies to foster electric vehicle adoption has found that electric passenger cars are mostly recharged at home. This means we need solutions to help those without off-street parking get access to convenient local rechargers. This will help Australia reduce its balance of trade problems, reduce our health costs, and help the environment.

We just have to hope our government comes on board with suitable regulatory action to help us all go electric. One step might be to follow the US government’s recent announcement that it will electrify its entire fleet of vehicles. This will help car manufacturers, help bring down carbon emissions, help reduce the nation’s health budget and also help everyday people reduce their transport costs, which would be fairer and more sustainable.The Conversation

Gail Broadbent, PhD candidate Faculty of Science UNSW, UNSW and Graciela Metternicht, Professor of Environmental Geography, School of Biological Earth and Environmental Sciences, UNSW Sydney, UNSW

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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How to cut your fuel bill, clear the air and reduce emissions: stop engine idling



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Robin Smit, University of Technology Sydney and Clare Walter, The University of Queensland

The transport sector is Australia’s second-largest polluter, pumping out almost 20% of our total greenhouse gas emissions. But everyday drivers can make a difference.

In particular, the amount of time you let your car engine idle can have a significant impact on emissions and local air quality. Engine idling is when the car engine is running while the vehicle is stationary, such as at a red light.

Opting for a bike is a great way to reduce your carbon footprint.
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A new Transport Energy/Emission Research report found in normal traffic conditions, Australians likely idle more than 20% of their drive time.

This contributes 1% to 8% of total carbon dioxide emissions over the journey, depending on the vehicle type. To put that into perspective, removing idling from the journey would be like removing up to 1.6 million cars from the road.



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Excessive idling (idling for longer than five minutes) could increase this contribution further, particularly for trucks and buses. When you also consider how extensive idling may create pollution hot spots around schools, this isn’t something to take lightly.

Pollution hot spots

Reducing idling doesn’t just lower your carbon footprint, it can also lower your fuel costs up to 10% or more.

Drivers simply have to turn their engines off while parked and wait in their vehicle. Perhaps crack open a window to maintain comfortable conditions, rather than switching on the air conditioner.

Some idling is unavoidable such as waiting for a traffic light or driving in congested conditions, but other idling is unnecessary, such as while parked.



Read more:
Transport is letting Australia down in the race to cut emissions

When many cars are idling in the same location, it can create poor local air quality. For example, idling has been identified overseas as a significant factor in higher pollution levels in and around schools. That’s because parents or school buses don’t turn off their engines when they drop off their kids or wait for them outside.

Parked you car? Turn off the engine.
Shutterstock

Even small reductions in vehicle emissions can have health benefits, such as reducing asthma, allergies and systemic inflammation in Australian children. In 2019, Australian researchers identified that even small increases of exposure to vehicle pollution were associated with an increased risk of childhood asthma and reduced lung function.

Anti-idling campaigns make a difference

Overseas studies show anti-idling campaigns and driver education can help improve air quality around schools, with busses and passenger cars switching off their engines more frequently.

In the US and Canada, local and state governments have enacted voluntary or mandatory anti-idling legislation, to address complaints and reduce fuel use, emissions and noise.

The results have been promising. In California, a range of measures – including anti-idling policies – aimed at reducing school children’s exposure to vehicle emissions were linked to the development of larger, healthier lungs in children.



Read more:
Australians could have saved over $1 billion in fuel if car emissions standards were introduced 3 years ago

But in Australia, we identified almost no anti-idling initiatives or idle reduction legislation, despite calls for them in 2017.

However, “eco-driving”, as well as a promising new campaign called “Idle Off” is poised to roll out to secondary school students in Australia.

What about commercial vehicles?

Commercial vehicles can idle for long periods of time. In the US, typical long-haul trucks idle an estimated 1,800 hours per year when parked at truck stops, although a significant range of between 1,000 and 2,500 hours per year has also been reported.



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Fleet operators and logistics companies are therefore in a good position to roll out idle reduction initiatives and save on operating (fuel) costs while reducing emissions.

In fact, fleet operators overseas have actively sought to reduce idling emissions. This is not surprising as fuel costs are the second-largest expense for fleets, behind driver wages, typically accounting for 20% of a trucking fleet’s total operating costs.

The transport sector contributes 18.8% of Australia’s total emissions.
Shutterstock

Various technologies are available overseas that reduce idling emissions, such as stop-start systems, anti-idling devices (trucks) and battery electric vehicles.

But unlike other developed countries, Australia doesn’t have fuel efficiency or carbon dioxide emission standards. This means vehicle manufacturers have no incentive to include idle reduction technologies (or other fuel-saving technologies) in vehicles sold in Australia.

For example, the use of stop-start systems is rapidly growing overseas, but it’s unclear how many stop-start systems are used in new Australian cars.

Emission reduction technologies also come with extra costs for the vehicle manufacturer, making them less appealing, although cost benefits of reduced fuel use would pass on to consumers. This situation probably won’t change unless mandatory emission standards are implemented.

In any case, it’s easy for drivers to simply turn the key and shut down the engine when suitable. Reducing idling doesn’t require technologies.

Reducing your carbon footprint

If reducing emissions or saving money at the fuel bowser is not enough incentive, then perhaps, in time, exposing children to unnecessary idling emissions will be regarded in the same socially unacceptable light as smoking around children.



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And of course, there are other measures to reduce your transport carbon footprint. Drive a smaller car, and avoid diesel cars. Despite their reputation, Australian diesel cars emit, on average, about 10% more carbon dioxide per kilometre than petrol cars.

Or better yet, where possible, dust off that push bike, or walk.The Conversation

Robin Smit, Adjunct associate professor, University of Technology Sydney and Clare Walter, PhD Candidate, Honorary Research Fellow, Advocacy Consultant., The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Climate explained: does your driving speed make any difference to your car’s emissions?



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Ralph Sims, Massey University


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Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change.

If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nz

Does reducing speed reduce emissions from the average car?

Every car has an optimal speed range that results in minimum fuel consumption, but this range differs between vehicle types, design and age.

Typically it looks like this graph below: fuel consumption rises from about 80km/h, partly because air resistance increases.


Author provided

But speed is only one factor. No matter what car you are driving, you can reduce fuel consumption (and therefore emissions) by driving more smoothly.

This includes anticipating corners and avoiding sudden braking, taking the foot off the accelerator just before reaching the peak of a hill and cruising over it, and removing roof racks or bull bars and heavier items from inside when they are not needed to make the car lighter and more streamlined.



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Climate explained: the environmental footprint of electric versus fossil cars

Driving wisely

In New Zealand, EnergyWise rallies used to be run over a 1200km course around the North Island. They were designed to demonstrate how much fuel could be saved through good driving habits.

The competing drivers had to reach each destination within a certain time period. Cruising too slowly at 60-70km/h on straight roads in a 100km/h zone just to save fuel was not an option (also because driving too slowly on open roads can contribute to accidents).

The optimum average speed (for both professional and average drivers) was typically around 80km/h. The key to saving fuel was driving smoothly.

In the first rally in 2002, the Massey University entry was a brand new diesel-fuelled Volkswagen Golf (kindly loaned by VW NZ), running on 100% biodiesel made from waste animal fat (as Z Energy has been producing).

A car running on fossil diesel emits about 2.7kg of carbon dioxide per litre and a petrol car produces 2.3kg per litre. Using biofuels to displace diesel or petrol can reduce emissions by up to 90% per kilometre if the biofuel is made from animal fat from a meat works. The amount varies depending on the source of the biofuel (sugarcane, wheat, oilseed rape). And of course it would be unacceptable if biofuel crops were replacing food crops or forests.

Regardless of the car, drivers can reduce fuel consumption by 15-20% by improving driving habits alone – reducing emissions and saving money at the same time.



Read more:
Climate explained: what each of us can do to reduce our carbon footprint

Fuel efficiency

When you are thinking of replacing your car, taking into account fuel efficiency is another important way to save on fuel costs and reduce emissions.

Many countries, including the US, Japan, China and nations within the European Union, have had fuel efficiency standards for more than a decade. This has driven car manufacturers to design ever more fuel-efficient vehicles.

Most light-duty vehicles sold globally are subject to these standards. But Australia and New Zealand have both dragged the chain in this regard, partly because most vehicles are imported.



Read more:
Australians could have saved over $1 billion in fuel if car emissions standards were introduced 3 years ago

New Zealand also remains hesitant about introducing a “feebate” scheme, which proposes a fee on imported high-emission cars to make imported hybrids, electric cars and other efficient vehicles cheaper with a subsidy.

In New Zealand, driving an electric car results in low emissions because electricity generation is 85% renewable. In Australia, which still relies on coal-fired power, electric cars are responsible for higher emissions unless they are recharged through a local renewable electricity supply.

Fuel and electricity prices will inevitably rise. But whether we drive a petrol or electric car, we can all shield ourselves from some of those future price rises by driving more efficiently and less speedily.



Read more:
Climate explained: why switching to electric transport makes sense even if electricity is not fully renewable


The Conversation

Ralph Sims, Professor, School of Engineering and Advanced Technology, Massey University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Australians could have saved over $1 billion in fuel if car emissions standards were introduced 3 years ago



Legislative action regarding vehicle emissions is overdue, and needs urgent attention by the federal government.
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Robin Smit, The University of Queensland; Jake Whitehead, The University of Queensland, and Nic Surawski, University of Technology Sydney

When it comes to road transport, Australia is at risk of becoming a climate villain as we lag behind international best practice on fuel efficiency.

Road transport is one of the main sources of greenhouse gas emissions and represented 16% of Australia’s total carbon dioxide emissions in 2000, growing to 21% in 2016. Total CO₂ emissions from road transport increased by almost 30% in the period 2000-16.

Fuel efficiency (CO₂ emission) standards have been adopted in around 80% of the global light vehicle market to cap the growth of transport emissions. This includes the United States, the European Union, Canada, Japan, China, South Korea and India – but not Australia.



Read more:
Emissions standards on cars will save Australians billions of dollars, and help meet our climate targets

If Australia had introduced internationally harmonised emissions legislation three years ago, households could have made savings on fuel costs to the tune of A$1 billion.

This shocking figure comes from our preliminary calculations looking at the effect of requiring more efficient vehicles to be sold in Australia.

A report, published yesterday by Transport Energy/Emission Research, looked at what Australia has achieved in vehicle fuel efficiency and CO₂ standards over the past 20 years. While Australia has considered and tried to impose standards a number of times, sadly these attempts were unsuccessful.

Legislative action on vehicle CO₂ emissions is long overdue and demands urgent attention by the Australian government.

Australian consumers are increasingly buying heavier vehicles with bigger emissions.
Shuterstock

How did Australia get here?

The most efficient versions of vehicle models offered in Australia are considerably less efficient than similar vehicles in other markets.

Australia could increasingly become a dumping ground for the world’s least efficient vehicles with sub-par emissions performance, given our lack of fuel efficiency standards. This leaves us on a dangerous path towards not only higher vehicle emissions, but also higher fuel costs for passenger travel and freight.

Australia has attempted to impose CO₂ or fuel efficiency standards on light vehicles several times over the past 20 years, but without success. While the federal government was committed to addressing this issue in 2015, four years later we are still yet to hear when – or even if – mandatory fuel efficiency standards will ever be introduced.

The general expectation appears to be that average CO₂ emission rates of new cars in Australia will reduce over time as technology advances overseas. In the absence of CO₂ standards locally, it is more likely that consumers will continue to not be offered more efficient cars, and pay higher fuel costs as a consequence.

Estimating the fuel savings

Available evidence suggests Australian motorists are paying on average almost 30% more for fuel than they should because of the lack of fuel efficiency standards.

The Australian vehicle fleet uses about 32 billion litres of fuel per year.

Using an Australian fleet model described in the TER report, we can make a conservative estimate that the passenger vehicle fleet uses about half of this fuel: 16 billion litres per year. New cars entering the fleet each year would represent about 5% of this: 800 million litres per year.

So assuming that mandatory CO₂ standards improve fuel efficiency by 27%, fuel savings would be 216 million litres per year.

In the last three years, the average fuel price across Australia’s five major cities is A$1.33 per litre. This equates to a total savings of A$287 million per year, although this would be about half the first year as new cars are purchased throughout the year and travel less, and would reduce as vehicles travel less when they age.

The savings are accumulative because a car purchased in a particular year continues to save fuel over the following years.

The table below shows a rough calculation of savings over the three year period (2016-2018), for new cars sold in the same period (Model Years 2016, 2017 and 2018).

As a result, over a period of three years, A$1.3 billion in potential savings for car owners would have accumulated.

Policy has come close, but what are we waiting for?

The Australian government is not progressing any measures to introduce a fuel efficiency target. In fact, it recently labelled Labor’s proposed fuel efficiency standard as a “car tax”.

But Australia has come close to adopting mandatory vehicle CO₂ emission standards in the past.

In late 2007, the Labor government committed to cutting emissions to achieve Australia’s obligations under the Kyoto Protocol. The then prime minister, Kevin Rudd, instructed the Vehicle Efficiency Working Group to:

… develop jointly a package of vehicle fuel efficiency measures designed to move Australia towards international best practice.

Then, in 2010, the Labor government decided mandatory CO₂ emissions standards would apply to new light vehicles from 2015. But a change in government in 2013 meant these standards did not see the light of day.

The amount of fuel that could have been saved is A$287 million per year.
Shutterstock

Things looked promising again when the Coalition government released a Vehicle Emissions Discussion Paper in 2016, followed by a draft Regulation Impact Statement in the same year.

The targets for adopting this policy in 2025, considered in the draft statement, were marked as “strong” (105g of CO₂ per km), “medium” (119g/km) and “mild” (135g/km) standards.

Under all three targets, there would be significant net cost savings. But since 2016, the federal government has taken no further action.

It begs the question: what exactly are we waiting for?

The technical state of play

Transport Energy/Emission Research conducted preliminary modelling of Australian real-world CO₂ emissions.

This research suggests average CO₂ emission rates of the on-road car fleet in Australia are actually increasing over time and are, in reality, higher than what is officially reported in laboratory emissions tests.

In fact, the gap between mean real-world emissions and the official laboratory tests is expected to grow from 20% in 2010 to 65% in 2025.

This gap is particularly concerning when we look at the lack of support for low-emissions vehicles like electric cars.



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Why battery-powered vehicles stack up better than hydrogen

Given that fleet turnover is slow, the benefits of fuel efficiency standards would only begin to have a significant effect several years into the future.

With continuing population growth, road travel will only increase further. This will put even more pressure on the need to reduce average real-world CO₂ emission rates, given the increasing environmental and health impacts of the vehicle fleet.

Even if the need to reduce emissions doesn’t convince you, the cost benefits of emissions standards should. The sale of less efficient vehicles in Australia means higher weekly fuel costs for car owners, which could be avoided with the introduction of internationally harmonised emissions legislation.The Conversation

Robin Smit, Adjunct professor, The University of Queensland; Jake Whitehead, Research Fellow, The University of Queensland, and Nic Surawski, Lecturer in Environmental Engineering, University of Technology Sydney

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Why battery-powered vehicles stack up better than hydrogen



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A battery electric vehicle in The University of Queensland’s vehicle fleet.
CC BY-ND

Jake Whitehead, The University of Queensland; Robin Smit, The University of Queensland, and Simon Washington, The University of Queensland

Low energy efficiency is already a major problem for petrol and diesel vehicles. Typically, only 20% of the overall well-to-wheel energy is actually used to power these vehicles. The other 80% is lost through oil extraction, refinement, transport, evaporation, and engine heat. This low energy efficiency is the primary reason why fossil fuel vehicles are emissions-intensive, and relatively expensive to run.

With this in mind, we set out to understand the energy efficiency of electric and hydrogen vehicles as part of a recent paper published in the Air Quality and Climate Change Journal.

Electric vehicles stack up best

Based on a wide scan of studies globally, we found that battery electric vehicles have significantly lower energy losses compared to other vehicle technologies. Interestingly, however, the well-to-wheel losses of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles were found to be almost as high as fossil fuel vehicles.

Average well-to-wheel energy losses from different vehicle drivetrain technologies, showing typical values and ranges. Note: these figures account for production, transport and propulsion, but do not capture manufacturing energy requirements, which are currently marginally higher for electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles compared to fossil fuel vehicles.

At first, this significant efficiency difference may seem surprising, given the recent attention on using hydrogen for transport.



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While most hydrogen today (and for the foreseeable future) is produced from fossil fuels, a zero-emission pathway is possible if renewable energy is used to:

Herein lies one of the significant challenges in harnessing hydrogen for transport: there are many more steps in the energy life cycle process, compared with the simpler, direct use of electricity in battery electric vehicles.

Each step in the process incurs an energy penalty, and therefore an efficiency loss. The sum of these losses ultimately explains why hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, on average, require three to four times more energy than battery electric vehicles, per kilometre travelled.

Electricity grid impacts

The future significance of low energy efficiency is made clearer upon examination of the potential electricity grid impacts. If Australia’s existing 14 million light vehicles were electric, they would need about 37 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity per year — a 15% increase in national electricity generation (roughly equivalent to Australia’s existing annual renewable generation).

But if this same fleet was converted to run on hydrogen, it would need more than four times the electricity: roughly 157 TWh a year. This would entail a 63% increase in national electricity generation.

A recent Infrastructure Victoria report reached a similar conclusion. It calculated that a full transition to hydrogen in 2046 – for both light and heavy vehicles – would require 64 TWh of electricity, the equivalent of a 147% increase in Victoria’s annual electricity consumption. Battery electric vehicles, meanwhile, would require roughly one third the amount (22 TWh).



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Some may argue that energy efficiency will no longer be important in the future given some forecasts suggest Australia could reach 100% renewable energy as soon as the 2030s. While the current political climate suggests this will be challenging, even as the transition occurs, there will be competing demands for renewable energy between sectors, stressing the continuing importance of energy efficiency.



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At its current rate, Australia is on track for 50% renewable electricity in 2025

It should also be recognised that higher energy requirements translate to higher energy prices. Even if hydrogen reached price parity with petrol or diesel in the future, electric vehicles would remain 70-90% cheaper to run, because of their higher energy efficiency. This would save the average Australian household more than A$2,000 per year.

Pragmatic plan for the future

Despite the clear energy efficiency advantages of electric vehicles over hydrogen vehicles, the truth is there is no silver bullet. Both technologies face differing challenges in terms of infrastructure, consumer acceptance, grid impacts, technology maturity and reliability, and driving range (the volume needed for sufficient hydrogen compared with the battery energy density for electric vehicles).

Battery electric vehicles are not yet a suitable replacement for every vehicle on our roads. But based on the technology available today, it is clear that a significant proportion of the current fleet could transition to be battery electric, including many cars, buses, and short-haul trucks.

Such a transition represents a sensible, robust and cost-efficient approach for delivering the significant transport emission reductions required within the short time frames outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s recent report on restraining global warming to 1.5℃, while also reducing transport costs.

Together with other energy-efficient technologies, such as the direct export of renewable electricity overseas, battery electric vehicles will ensure that the renewable energy we generate over the coming decades is used to reduce the greatest amount of emissions, as quickly as possible.



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Meanwhile, research should continue into energy efficient options for long-distance trucks, shipping and aircraft, as well as the broader role for both hydrogen and electrification in reducing emissions across other sectors of the economy.

With the Federal Senate Select Committee on Electric Vehicles set to deliver its final report on December 4, let’s hope the continuing importance of energy efficiency in transport has not been forgotten.The Conversation

Jake Whitehead, Research Fellow, The University of Queensland; Robin Smit, Adjunct professor, The University of Queensland, and Simon Washington, Professor and Head of School of Civil Engineering, The University of Queensland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Not so fast: why the electric vehicle revolution will bring problems of its own



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Electric cars are taking over – but they really as green as they look?
Jack Amick / flickr, CC BY-NC

Martin Brueckner, Murdoch University

After years of being derided as a joke by car manufacturers and the public, interest in electric vehicles has increased sharply as governments around the world move to ban petrol and diesel cars.

We have seen a tremendous rise in availability, especially at the premium end of the market, where Tesla is giving established brands a run for their money. Electric cars are likely to penetrate the rest of the market quickly too. Prices should be on par with conventional cars by 2025.

Electric cars are praised as the answer to questions of green and clean mobility. But the overall sustainability of electric vehicles is far from clear. On closer examination, our entire transport paradigm may need to be rethought.



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Australia’s ‘electric car revolution’ won’t happen automatically

Compared with combustion engines, electric transport has obvious advantages for emissions and human health. Transport is responsible for around 23% of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions globally. This is expected to double by 2050.

Motor vehicles also put a burden on society, especially in urban environments where they are chiefly responsible for noise and air pollution. Avoiding these issues is why electric vehicles are considered a key technology in cleaning up the transport sector. However, electric cars come with problems of their own.

Dirt in the supply chain

For one, electric vehicles have a concerning supply chain. Cobalt, a key component of the lithium-ion batteries in electric cars, is linked to reports of child labour. The nickel used in those same batteries is toxic to extract from the ground. And there are environmental concerns and land use conflicts connected with lithium mining in countries like Tibet and Bolivia.

The elements used in battery production are finite and in limited supply. This makes it impossible to electrify all of the world’s transport with current battery technology. Meanwhile, there is still no environmentally safe way of recycling lithium-ion batteries.

While electric cars produce no exhaust, there is concern about fine particle emissions. Electric cars are often heavier than conventional cars, and heavier vehicles are often accompanied by higher levels of non-exhaust emissions. The large torque of electric vehicles further adds to the fine dust problem, as it causes greater tyre wear and dispersion of dust particles.

Different motor, same problem

Electric vehicles share many other issues with conventional cars too. Both require roads, parking areas and other infrastructure, which is especially a problem in cities. Roads divide communities and make access to essential services difficult for those without cars.

A shift in people’s reliance on combustion cars to electric cars also does little to address sedentary urban lifestyles, as it perpetuates our lack of physical activity.

Other problems relate to congestion. In Australia, the avoidable social cost of traffic congestion in 2015 was estimated at A$16.5 billion. This is expected to increase by 2% every year until 2030. Given trends in population growth and urbanisation globally and in Australia, electric cars – despite obvious advantages over fossil fuels – are unlikely to solve urban mobility and infrastructure-related problems.

Technology or regulation may solve these technical and environmental headaches. Improvements in recycling, innovation, and the greening of battery factories can go a long way towards reducing the impacts of battery production. Certification schemes, such as the one proposed in Sweden, could help deliver low-impact battery value chains and avoid conflict minerals and human rights violations in the industry.

A new transport paradigm

Yet, while climate change concerns alone seem to warrant a speedy transition towards electric mobility, it may prove to be merely a transition technology. Electric cars will do little for urban mobility and liveability in the years to come. Established car makers such as Porsche are working on new modes of transportation, especially for congested and growing markets such as China.

Nevertheless, their vision is still one of personal vehicles – relying on electric cars coupled with smart traffic guidance systems to avoid urban road congestion. Instead of having fewer cars, as called for by transport experts, car makers continue to promote individualised transport, albeit a greener version.

With a growing population, a paradigm shift in transport may be needed – one that looks to urban design to solve transportation problems.

In Copenhagen, for example, bikes now outnumber cars in the city’s centre, which is primed to be car-free within the next ten years. Many other cities, including Oslo in Norway and Chengdu in China, are also on their way to being free of cars.

Experts are already devising new ways to design cities. They combine efficient public transport, as found in Curitiba, Brazil, with principles of walkability, as seen in Vauben, Germany. They feature mixed-use, mixed-income and transit-oriented developments, as seen in places like Fruitvale Village in Oakland, California.



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Designing suburbs to cut car use closes gaps in health and wealth

These developments don’t just address transport-related environmental problems. They enhance liveability by reclaiming urban space for green developments. They reduce the cost of living by cutting commuting cost and time. They deliver health benefits, thanks to reduced pollution and more active lifestyles. They improve social cohesion, by fostering human interaction in urban streetscapes, and help to reduce crime. And of course, they improve economic performance by reducing the loss of productivity caused by congestion.

The ConversationElectric cars are a quick-to-deploy technology fix that helps tackle climate change and improve urban air quality – at least to a point. But the sustainability endgame is to eliminate many of our daily travel needs altogether through smart design, while improving the parts of our lives we lost sight of during our decades-long dependence on cars.

Martin Brueckner, Senior Lecturer in Sustainability, Murdoch University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Utopia or nightmare? The answer lies in how we embrace self-driving, electric and shared vehicles



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Four major disruptions of urban transport are set to transform city life, but exactly how remains uncertain.
Taras Makarenko/Pexels, CC BY

Jake Whitehead, The University of Queensland and Michael Kane, Curtin University

Emerging transport disruptions could lead to a series of nightmare scenarios and poorer transport systems unless we have sensible and informed public policy to avoid this. Of course, some foresee a utopian scene: self-driving electric vehicles zipping around our cities serving all our transport needs without road accidents or exhaust fumes. But the shift to this transport utopia might not be as straightforward as some think.

In a newly published paper, we explore some potential problems linked to vehicle electrification, autonomous vehicles, the sharing economy and the increasing density of cities. We examined what could happen if these four trends are not all properly managed together.

Much has been written about the potential benefits of these disruptions:

  • electric vehicles powered by renewable energy could cut costs and fossil fuel emissions, and eliminate the significant impacts of pollution on public health and the environment

  • shared vehicles could reduce transport costs and traffic

  • autonomous vehicles could eliminate traffic accidents, reduce congestion and increase mobility for everyone

  • increasing urban density could bring significant economic benefits through growth and efficiency gains when people and businesses are closer together.

However, the interplay between these trends could also result in nightmare scenarios. We developed a Future Mobility Disruption Framework to investigate what could happen if even one of these trends is not actively managed.

The interactions of transport disruptions need to be anticipated and managed together.
Kane & Whitehead 2018, Australian Planner, Author provided

Four nightmare scenarios

Our research identified four potential nightmare scenarios.

Nightmare 1: vehicle electrification + autonomous vehicles + increasing urban density

If policy fails to support and manage a shift away from private vehicle ownership towards car-sharing, several negative impacts are likely. In this scenario, electric cars will be cheaper to run and still privately owned. This could encourage more people to drive and create more traffic.

The convenience of self-driving cars with low operating costs might also encourage a shift away from traditional public transport and could even cause its collapse.

Nightmare 2: autonomous vehicles + increasing urban density + shift towards sharing economy

If people shift from private car ownership towards shared, autonomous vehicles, significant transport cost savings could be possible. By replacing public transport systems, shared vehicle services could arguably provide cheap transport for all.

While these benefits are obvious, without vehicle electrification, the use of fossil fuels would significantly increase emissions. Though a reduction in emissions is plausible with a shift away from private vehicle ownership, the low cost and convenience of shared vehicles could lead to higher demand and more trips, thus increasing emissions. This pollution would increase rates of premature deaths and diseases in our cities, and worsen the impacts of climate change.

Nightmare 3: increasing urban density + shift towards sharing economy + vehicle electrification

We would again see a shift away from private vehicle ownership towards shared, electric vehicles. This would reduce transport and pollution-related health costs However, in this scenario, the vehicles would not be autonomous.

The shared vehicle fleet would require human drivers. This would result in higher costs, less efficiency and more accidents. Ultimately, this would be a barrier to the long-term sustainability and widespread use of shared vehicles.

Nightmare 4: shift towards sharing economy + vehicle electrification + autonomous vehicles

So what would happen in the face of three of the transport disruptions occurring without increasing urban density? Electric and autonomous vehicles would significantly reduce transport costs. Combined with the availability of shared services, this would lead to a substantial shift away from private vehicle ownership towards shared, electric, autonomous vehicles (SEAVs).

These vehicles would be efficient, safe and convenient, with minimal environmental impacts. At first this would seem like the ideal scenario to aim for. However, it ignores the potential impacts on urban form and density.

Without policies supporting urban density and public transport, a shift towards SEAVs would probably encourage sprawling, car-dominated cities as people would have fewer reasons to live close to work. SEAVs would be cheap and convenient. They could pick people up from their front door and drop them directly at their destination. People would likely not be as concerned with road congestion as they could carry out other activities during the trip – even working during the drive.

If people feel less restricted in where they choose to live, they might opt for larger houses and lots, further away from cities. This would not only place additional demands on infrastructure but also have a significant impact on the natural environments surrounding our cities.

This form of lower-density living would discourage active transport options, like walking and cycling, which would have negative health impacts. Urban sprawl could also have negative economic impacts as people and businesses spread out and lose the benefits of being close together.

Managing disruptions as a whole

Each of these four trends could independently yield many benefits. However, examination of these nightmare scenarios reveals that, without holistic planning and policy support for all four disruptions, negative unintended consequences are likely. Planners and policymakers must consider how these disruptions will interact.

As detailed in our paper, a range of possible policy interventions is available for managing the risks associated with these trends. These include reform of road taxation, supportive regulation and integrated planning.

Only a holistic approach to managing these disruptions will enable us to arrive at a future transport utopia.

The ConversationYou can read more about these transport disruptions in a forthcoming book, Three Revolutions.

Jake Whitehead, Research Fellow, The University of Queensland and Michael Kane, Director, Innovation and Economic Strategies, Economic Development Queensland; Research Associate, Curtin University Sustainability Policy Institute, Curtin University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Australia: Queensland – Electric Vehicle Highway


The link below is to an article that takes a look at Australia’s planned electric vehicle highway in Queensland.

For more visit:
http://e360.yale.edu/digest/australia-is-building-a-1250-mile-highway-for-electric-vehicles

Media Release: Myall Coast Beaches Closed to 4WDs


The link below is to a media release concerning the closure of Myall Coast beaches to vehicles due to weather conditions.

For more visit:
http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/media/OEHmedia1306201300.htm

ELECTRIC CARS COMING SOONER RATHER THAN LATER


In great news for the environment and consumers it seems that ‘green cars’ will be arriving in Australia sooner rather than later, with infrastructure for electric cars to be set up in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne within four years. The project is a joint venture between AGL, Macquarie Capital and Better Place.

The project aims to set up recharge stations for electric cars at workplaces, homes and shopping centres. It is thought that some 250 000 recharge stations will be built in the project. Such projects have already been set up in Israel and Denmark.

Macquarie Capital is to raise $1 billion to build the recharging network, with AGL to supply renewable energy for the project. Better Place will actually build the network.

Should the project go ahead and the infrastructure be built, motorists will be able to dump petrol and diesel vehicles and move to electric ones. This will of course be a great relief from rising fuel costs and help protect the environment from further greenhouse gas emissions.