Leading in low carbon transport
Making the UK a global leader in the development and production of low carbon vehicles
Our transport system is fundamental to our economic strength, connecting people to places and businesses to markets. However, the only sustainable future for transportation lies in a transformative shift to low carbon. Our ambition must be for the UK to be a world leader in low carbon transport, especially at the forefront of development and manufacture of low carbon automotive technology.
We have already committed over £350 million of support to encourage uptake of ultra-low emission vehicles and our support for the automotive sector in the downturn has been designed to help secure its long-term future as a world leading low carbon industry. We now need to equip the UK to compete in the global market both for vehicles and their components.
This means removing barriers to private sector investment, accelerating the development of low carbon road transport technologies through support for low carbon vehicle research and development, showing leadership through our public procurement policies, and making the UK a leading global location to demonstrate low carbon vehicle technology, as well as in other systems such as rail transport.
Our Low Carbon Industrial Strategy will set out how, working with the private sector, we can coordinate public sector activity to ensure the UK is a global leader in developing, demonstrating and manufacturing ultra-low emission vehicles and vehicle components.
- What is the best way for Government and business to work together to secure a world leading position for the UK in low carbon transport?
Share:
Delicious
Digg
Facebook
Reddit
StumbleUpon
My company has a breakthrough technology for EV batteries and other portable electric power applications. This work is based on 10yrs R&D in UK and France and has been independently peer reviewed. This year we will be completing the development of the prototype EV battery and we will also start production of some other low power products.
This technology has the potential to re-establish a large and robust UK-based manufacturing business. We have serious investor interest in UK and any practical help from UK Govt would only accelerate the industrialisation process.
We are in discussion with UK T&I and the SWRDA, however, higher level direct investment is probably appropriate to move faster.
Please contact me if you wish to discuss this further.
Regards
Trevor Jackson
CEO
Metalectrique Limited.
What is the best way for Government and business to work together to secure a world leading position for the UK in low carbon transport?
1. To adopt a multi-faceted and multi-modal cross-Government strategy, aimed at achieving carbon emissions reduction targets, which offers scope for developing cutting-edge technology while, at the same time, funding the Skills Academies and College and University courses required to optimise the talents of the workforce needed by industry.
2. To recognise that a low carbon industry – the railways – already exists which offers enormous scope for technological development. In the EU the aim is to achieve interoperability of rail (both passenger and freight); dedicated international rail freight lines are being constructed and Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) seem to be the way forward. Britain should play a key role in this.
3. To ensure that rail transport is specifically included in low –carbon plans and transport sector carbon budgets by the Climate Change Committee, who seem to be focused on future innovations in road transport whilst ignoring the current benefits of rail. The Department for Energy and Climate Change, the Department for Transport and the Climate Change Committee should recognise that road and rail solutions to cutting carbon emissions are not mutually exclusive but complementary. For instance, a strategic rail freight network servicing deep-sea ports and airports would still require low-carbon road transport for local deliveries of goods.
4. To explore the potential of technological advances in river and coastal water transport to help reduce carbon emissions. The EU Motorways of the Sea concept currently being considered, whereby cargo arriving at deep-sea ports can be transferred to river or coastal shipping for the next stage of its journey, is also exciting. It would be an excellent way to reduce the harmful pollution of heavy goods traffic and would, for example, benefit regional economies with smaller port facilities. Again, innovative low-carbon road transport would be required for final journeys to end-users.
5. To ensure that the strategic infrastructure for rail freight (which is usually shared with passenger traffic so benefits both services) is properly funded to the level required to achieve the modal shift from road to rail needed to meet the Government’s ambitious carbon emissions reduction targets. This work should start immediately (Stern) if we are to play our part in reducing the risks of Climate Change in the timescale required.
Whilst a shift to low carbon vehicles is clearly a crucial issue, how disappointing that almost the entire statement here is on that alone.
What about the investment needed to foster substantial shifts to cycling and walking for shorter journeys - other European countries have done it, with (to us) incredible levels of up to 40% of journeys by bike. These countries have shown that what is needed is the requisite comparatively low investment and the political will. Several cities in the US are now also moving that way, with an enthusiasm unimaginable in the UK.
Lord Adair Turner of the UK Climate Change Advisory Cttee, in his recent Edinburgh lecture, pointed out that whilst a shift to electric vehicles is critical, it is also important to take advantage of available quick wins, in which he included modal shift to walking and cycling.
Finally, the one brief mention of rail in the statement is again about efficiency of vehicles - nothing about modal shift. No mention of water transport, and no discussion of air!
Decades of focus on suburan living and centralised working habits have resulted in a dependence on independent travel through personal transport in many locations. Planning guidance to reduce the opportunities for car-focussed shopping parks and investment in charging stations in areas where mass public transport is not viable will assist.
One crucial step will be to take positive steps to reduce the economic impetus for reliance on air travel and air freight transport. The economy is currently slowing down and there will be a huge benefit to the entire system taking a slightly slower pace so that transport carbon costs reduce.
Overall, the government needs to help re-establish a local manufacturing and supply chain to replace the global system which relies too heavily on global transport of goods.
This appears a very one dimensional approach to the problem of transportation. Modal shift to other lower impact forms of transport are likely to be more effective. Even electric vehicles, which have many benefits over internal combustion, still have substantial disadvantages compared to say, cycling or walking- high embodied energy of the batteries, electrical energy consumption, relatively high embodied energy of infrastructure such as suitable roads, lock in to car-centric systems etc.
Moving freight by rail produces significantly lower CO2 and emissions than other modes and I would have expected a low carbon industrial strategy to promote modal alternatives. Our principal contacts are with the Department for Transport, who are not listed as regular readers of this site.
DB Schenker Rail (UK) Ltd is the largest rail freight haulier in the UK and we would be pleased to brief Ministers and Officials in the Business and Energy departments about the low carbon benefits of rail freight.
Moving freight by rail produces significantly lower CO2 and emissions than other modes and I would have expected a low carbon industrial strategy to promote modal alternatives. The principal contacts of rail freight hauliers are with the Department for Transport, who are not listed as regular readers of this site.
Rail freight operators would be pleased to brief Ministers and Officials in the Business and Energy departments about the low carbon benefits of rail freight including
Up to five times less CO2 per tonne mile than road
Up to ten times less emissions per tonne mile than road
National and international connectivity, which improves UK competitiveness
The best way for Government and business to work together to secure a world leading position for the UK in low carbon transport is to increase levels of public transport radically.
if you really want to encourage creativity in more efficient transport, you should stop propping up the existing large players who are more interested in their own short-term survival than survival of the planet. Better to free up some cash for smaller more innovative players. All the really interesting stuff (Lightning, Tesla, Riversimple) is coming from small companies.
I agree with the comments above.
My company is a member of the UK Low Carbon Vehicle Partnership (Innovation Working Group). We are developing a new kind of rotary engine which is ideally suited as a range extender for plug in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs).
1) Wherever possible secure UK production of low carbon vehicles and engines by OEMs e.g. Nissan / Toyota / BMW / Honda / Land Rover / (GM) Vauxhall / Peugeot / Jaguar / Ford.
2) Encourage UK companies such as BAE Systems, Rolls Royce and GKN to develop roles as tier 1 suppliers to automotive OEMs and to capacity build smaller UK companies into supply chains to produce low carbon vehicle systems and components.
3) Continue with Technology Strategy Board and RDA funding for UK Research, Development and Demonstration of low carbon technologies.
4) Focus on producing plug in hybrid technology (PHEV) – this will be the overall winner in terms of cost effectiveness and consumer acceptance against EU Emissions targets of 95g CO2 / km by 2020. Forecasts such as Global Insight, Roland Berger, J.D Power & Deutsche Bank are predicting 50% hybridisation in Europe by 2015 and in the US by 2020. EV penetration is predicted at about 15%. E.g. Honda Insight HEV (2009), Toyota Prius HEV (2009) Vauxhall Ampera PHEV (2011), Toyota Prius Plug-in PHEV (2011), Ford Connect Ampere EV (2011), Renault- Nissan Fluence EV (2011), BMW Mini EV (2011), Peugeot 3008 MPV HEV (2011), VW Twin Drive PHEV (2013).
Remember the average daily driving distance in the EU is only 27 km. A PHEV only needs a smaller cheaper 5kWh battery to deliver this range. It can act as an EV in urban areas (zero emissions)and as an HEV in extra urban areas. Studies show that this type of vehicle can deliver 75% fuel cost savings and 50% W-T-W CO2 savings for a price premium of about £3,000 (payback 2- 5 years).
5) Provide tax incentives for low carbon vehicle purchasing like the Obama administration. Economies of scale will remove the need for these, but the market needs to be kick started.
6) Continue with public procurement/ regulation programmes for low carbon vehicles – e.g. buses and utility vans.
7) Continue with the Energy Institute charging infrastructure project and J Cities project. Remember that at least 60% of charging can be done at home with no additional hardware needed. Small battery packs can even be carried in doors without too much difficulty. Electricity Utilities stand to gain from sale of under utilised night-time electricity and any additional public charging facilities (e.g. car parks) – they should bear the cost of installing new charging stations where needed.
Continue with bio-fuels initiatives e.g. Carbon Trust Algae Biofuels Challenge.
9) Read “Plugged In: The End of the Oil Age” (WWF, 2008).
“Automotive transport is ripe for transformation. We need to accelerate the commercialisation of vehicles with diversified primary energy sources, high efficiency and compatibility with a sustainable, renewable energy future. The electrification of automotive transport offers a promising way to achieve this objective. Grid connected vehicle technology – enabling all or part of every journey to be powered by electricity taken from the grid – is available based on existing infrastructure and current technology. Battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) supplemented by sustainable biofuels for range extension – can dramatically reduce the crude oil dependency of automotive transport in an efficient and sustainable manner.”
There is only one way to make the UK a leader in low carbon vehicles; create a large internal market. This is done by:
- legislation with very ambitious GHG targets
- supportive policies (subsidies) primarily on the (consumer) demand side
- supportive policies in knowledge infrastructure (support programs to create high tech centers of excellence around alreay existing science efforts)
- lifiting of certain policies(for instance; zoning) if they inhibit cluster formation
Offering an alternative to car ownership through pay as you go car clubs has been proven to act as catalyst to dramatic changes in use of sustainable modes. On top of this it locks in that good behaviour long term supporting the effect of other intiatives. ie: you are less likely to go back to commuting by car on a rainy day if there isnt a car on the drive. (Evidence listed at http://www.carplus.org.uk/carclubs/env-bens.htm)
Car clubs are growing fast in London where TFL are investing in new bays. Elsewhere growth is very slow or non existant. This is an opportunity being missed where a small amount of short term investment would yield high carbon saving returns.
I have 4 low carbon vehicles in my garage already. These are all bikes. I note that in the Copenhagen conurbation these amazing bits of early 20th Century technology provide the means for 30% of journeys….(public transport providing for 40% also - and private car use being the remainder - which is roughly half the UKs urban car usage.)
It strikes me that £350m invested in ‘Copenhagen-isation’ of our cities (usable and convenient cycling facilities rather than ‘farce-ilities’ favoured by petrolhead councillors, , well-lit & camera covered cycle parks, real traffic policing, etc.) will therefore deliver a demonstrably proven solution that could halve intra-urban mileage and and thereby eliminate c. 30% of emissions from surface transport within a 5 year timeframe.
In contrast £350m on the ‘Dan Dare’ electric vehicle ‘vision’ will achieve what ? being very generous we’ may get 10 % motor pool penetration by 2015, but probably only a 5%-6% direct emissions reduction given the range-restriction issues will dis-favour selection by hyper-commuters or any higher mileage users. How much of that notional 5%-6% reduction is then swallowed up by indirectly generated emissions (charging infrastructure construction, 3 yearly battery replacements @ £1200 (= 1200 barrels of oil or equivalent used in manufacturing process) and generation emissions (given 10+ years for nuclear expansion and the glacial tardiness of UK renewables development ) is anyone’s guess.
On balance therefore we can either
A) (horror of horrors) copy Johnny Foreigner and get 30% reductions on a ‘racing cert’ basis by 2015. or ..
B) Back the ‘Dan Dare’ strategy with, say an evens chance, of getting 2%-3% emissions reduction by 2015.
Given this is public money and there are incredibly powerful business interests who stand to profit from option B) I can guess which way Mr Hoon will jump
As someone has already pointed out electric cars only change the way energy is used it first has to be generated before the car can use it. Ok Wind turbines are supposedly clean but they only provide enough power to run our vacuum cleaners.
Figures show that the vacuum cleaners in the UK blow out more in wasted energy than a years output from 800, 165 ft high wind generators about 1.5 TWh of Electricity. Or A Boeing 737 could fly for six years non-stop on 1.5 TWh of energy.
I say wasted energy because it is not necessary to blow the air from the cleaner. AIR RECYCLING TECHNOLOGY can be used to recycle the normally wasted air saving 1.5 terawatt of electricity each year in the UK alone.
The recent Ecovacuum project conducted in Brussels has suggested new targets in energy saving that cleaner manufacturers will be expected to meet. However the Government have still failed to take an interest in a project that can save over 75 % of the power used by Vacuum Cleaners.
It is Air Recycling Technology and can make a 250 Watt cleaner work as efficiently as a 1,400. watt vacuum cleaner; this was the result of tests conducted for the Market Transformation Program.
Air Recycling Technology can save 1.5 Terawatt of electricity each year in the UK alone that is about £225,000,000. worth of electricity at 15p a unit and 650,000 Tons of CO2. Emissions Annually.
I was reading Richard Burns comment (submitted on 2009/04/16) and thought to respond
First, the UK Government is committed to increasing electricity generation from low carbon sources as quickly as is feasible; for example the UK now has the worlds largest offshore wind capacity. Second, the BERR DfT funded Cenex Arup study ,published in October 2008 shows that with the existing generation mix the gms per km of CO2 produced is 40% less than the combustion powered equivalent. This considers the CO2 produced from primary fuel extraction to the vehicles exhaust ie well to wheel. Improvements in technology and increased decarbonisation of electricity generation will further increase the carbon advantage of grid powered vehicles.
Hydrogen is not a solution for the short term. The current prototype vehicles cost 10x as much as their electric counterparts (in the order of £100,000) and serious technical barriers need to be overcome before mass production is a possibility. There is also an issue of how sufficient hydrogen can be generated to supply UK road transport - this requires energy in itself. In the medium term there is the potential for future generation nuclear reactors to produce hydrogen as a by-product but that is not technically feasible with the existing UK fleet. The UK recognises that hydrogen has potential and the door should not be closed on any technology but in the next 5 years we are not aware of any manufacture planning on mass producing hydrogen powered vehicles.
How could Government and business to work together to secure a world leading position for the UK in low carbon transport?
1. Flying is one of the fastest growing and most environmentally costly forms of transport. Most flights from the UK are for leisure purposes. Air Miles can typically save ~20% which is significant. However they are time limited.
The result of this is if someone is reducing their flying frequency to less than 1 per year the costs of teach flight could increase.
The Industry and goverment need to consider this issue and realise reducing flights from 1.5/yr to 0.9/yr could well drawf the move from one car to a slightly more efficient one.
2. £2k for older car trade ins between Govt. and manufacturers could be restricted to fuel efficient cars say under 120g/km. This would improve overall efficiency significantly more likely to help with the less well off, send a very clear message about efficient cars and be more acceptable generally and to tax paying non car owners such as myself.
Sir,
Transport and low carbon issues are high on the agenda but it seems the public at large are not taking it seriously. The cost of fuel is exhorbitant yet there are no public displays of anger, marches on Downing Street or road block convoys to demonstrate that this is too much. Perhaps the public can still afford to pay the prices. However, afford it or not, they are still not concerned enough about the exhaust emission effects on the Climate to take action. A system of fuel treatment, a patented magnetic application, has been available for 17 years with more than a million satisfied users where they are saving 10-20% of fuel in their cars and other means of transport and, at the same time, reducing their impact on Climate Change. The emergence of electric or fuel/electric cars is welcome provided we can can generate sufficient amounts and pay for the extra costs of electricity to charge the batteries but this total concept is a long way away from fruition. In the meantime the afore-mentioned treatment is available, easy to fit and will yield accountable results. So how can the population be persuaded to help themselves and the planet without reaching the mental switch off limit of too much information. Would it be possible to organise a Government Backed forum where providers of fuel saving systems can display their theories, claims and hardware rather than let market forces determine the progress to reducing carbon footprints.
Transport is not a technology or feat of engineering - it is a function.
Looking at the solutions should start there - what are **people** wanting to achieve: move goods, each other, independance etc. Then determine what balance of new ideas meet this.
Some transport is a requirement for now, some is a luxury.
Accounting for 25% or more of emissions transport is one major area where luxury has to be questioned.
The renewable energy availability will never be sufficient for profligate lifestyles, we have to reduce.
I think those who travel most due to the work the choose to do should be the first to holiday near home.
It may also improve quality of life in the long term. Who enjoys siting in a traffic jam breathing fumes?
It is easy to sit back and cherry pick transport areas to curb or eliminate but to see the real picture of what the impact is on the environment of transport as a whole you should drive for a day on our motorways. While you are becoming aware of the huge amount of traffic just imagine if all the drivers were taking action to make the fuel used burn better. They would go further, produce less emissions and we would all benefit. Unfortunately there are departments in the Transport Divison of the Government who feel that it is not productive to urge the public to explore ways and means of achieving this so they advise instead reduced travelling, car share, public transport, all piece meal solutions. The technology is available, we should be using it as standard.
I support the Government’s proposals on this though reading comments here I see much more can be done especially in freeing the market and public transport investment.
On a personal note, please please can we have electric plug in points at train station car parks? And a programme to support people who do not have driveways (such as me) to apply for an on-street plug in point in the pavement?