Publications

T&E reply HDV CO2 emission standards

January 12, 2018

The inception impact assessment focuses too much on the 2030 energy and climate targets only. Even if 2030 targets are important, they were set in 2014, before the Paris Agreement was signed. At that time, the European Union had a soft target for the transport sector to reduce its transport related emissions by 60% compared to 1990 (2011 Transport White Paper). However, the success of COP21 changed it all. Almost all countries in the planet agreed to limit climate change to 2 degrees, and to pursue efforts toward limiting warming to 1.5 degrees.

The European Commission is now in the process of revising its 2050 roadmap, in the light of the Paris Agreement. T&E commissioned a study to assess what the target for sectors not included in the EU emissions trading system (ETS), which includes transport, would need to be by 2050. Considering that there are certain sectors, like agriculture, that cannot completely decarbonise (incl. all GHG emissions), transport needs to reduce its emissions almost to zero if we want to reach our Paris climate targets.

Related Articles

View All
Batteries, Cars, Climate Instruments, Energy, Planes, Rail, Ships, Sustainable Finance, Trucks, Vans

Making the EU single market work for the Green Deal

T&E's paper on how to harmonise EU regulations to accelerate transport decarbonisation.

Climate Instruments

National climate targets off track

National climate targets off track

Six years left to course correct and avoid penalties

Climate Instruments

12 countries fail to meet 2030 climate targets

12 EU countries will fail to comply with 2030 national climate targets, new study

Germany and Italy are currently on course to miss targets by such a large gap that they would eat up all available surplus left for other countries. B...