Decarbonization in public transport

What is decarbonization? 

Transport accounts for 24% of worldwide CO2 emissions from fuel combustion. Road vehicles – cars, trucks, buses, and two-wheelers – are responsible for nearly three-quarters of these. That makes transport a major contributor to global warming and climate change.  

As awareness of this danger grows, so are the efforts to limit the amounts of harmful emissions from transportation, namely from fuel combustion engines. These efforts are called decarbonization.    

For the world to stay within a 2°C increase in average temperature, the transportation sector needs to be decarbonized. Governments around the world have set ambitious decarbonization targets. The European Union’s Green New Deal, for example, aims to reduce harmful emissions by 55% by 2030 and to become carbon neutral by 2050.  

To achieve these climate goals, a massive and rapid reduction of emissions from transport is necessary. This can mostly be done by transforming to non-carbon engines, such as electrical ones.  

Public transport and decarbonization  

In public transport, the main producers of harmful emissions are fuel-engine buses. If decarbonization is to succeed, emissions from diesel-fueled bus fleets in urban areas must be reduced.  

In the EU there is already legislation in place. The clean vehicle directive defines how a clean vehicle is fueled, and it sets quotas for procurement of low and zero emission public transport vehicles.  

Therefore, public transport operators must act now: If they haven’t done so yet, they should start planning the transformation of their fleets from diesel-fueled to those powered by cleaner forms of energy.  

Challenges of decarbonization in public transport 

Switching to electric vehicles means using cleaner energy, reducing harmful emissions, and less noise pollution.  

But there are several challenges to the introduction of clean-powered vehicles to public transport: 

• Charging e-buses takes longer, and their range is shorter compared to buses with combustion engines. Public transport operators must therefore rethink about vehicle scheduling and network design. 
• Charging infrastructure – namely the location and number of e-charging stations. It needs to be well-planned.  
• Operators must also choose the right size of batteries for the e-buses, according to their needs. 
• There is also a need to train public transport staff to handle high voltage operations. 

Utilizing public transport for decarbonation

Using public transport is a good way to contribute to decarbonization, regardless if the bus or train is still powered by combustion engines or is already electric. Therefore, governments and authorities encourage people to switch from cars to public transport by making the latter more attractive.  

One of the ways to do it is to introduce new ticketing concepts, which are uniformed and cheaper.   

Another way is to make car usage less attractive – namely more expensive for car owners. To this effect, many cities have introduced Low Emission Zones, and limit the amount of available parking space.