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The EU has set out on course towards a sustainable mobility system, aiming at providing users with more affordable and cleaner alternatives for transport of both passengers and goods. However, air pollution, noise and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are all challenges which have not yet been solved; resolving them will require persistent attention in the coming years.
Introduction
The European Climate Law sets out a legal commitment for Europe to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. To achieve this, reducing GHG emissions is necessary in all sectors of Europe’s economy. At the same time, the European Commission’s (EC) Communication on Zero Pollution put forward the ambition for 2030 to reduce by 55% the health impacts of air pollution and by 30% the share of people chronically disturbed by transport noise compared to 2005. However, unlike other sectors that have reduced their emissions in recent decades, transport emissions of GHG and of some pollutants such as ammonia (NH3) and nitrous oxide (N2O) continue to grow. In 2022, GHG emissions from the transport sector represented around a quarter of the EU total.
Passenger cars are responsible for more than 75% of transport activity in Europe (measured in passenger kilometres). This activity has increased significantly in the last 26 years, peaking in 2019 and already recovering in 2021 after a decline following the COVID-19 pandemic. While public transport offers a more sustainable profile compared to private modes of transport, its share in total passenger transport has changed very little. Passenger cars are still the preferred mode of transport, and their number has increased in recent years.
In recent years, consumer interest in long-distance train connections across Europe, including the reintroduction of sleeper trains, is gaining momentum, even if the grid is not yet fine meshed enough to offer a substantial alternative to car journeys.
Alongside the growth in passenger transport activity in Europe, road freight transport activity continues to grow significantly. This expansion is expected to continue in the next years, according to recent scenarios of the EC. Meanwhile, the relative importance of rail in total freight transport activity decreased compared to 1995 but is expected to expand in the coming decade. Due to its high energy efficiency and low GHG and air pollution emissions, expansion of the rail sector could be an opportunity for reducing some of the transport environmental impacts in the future.
Decarbonisation of domestic and international aviation and maritime transport faces notable challenges. These modes are expected to account for a progressively larger share of Europe’s GHG transport emissions in 2050, increasing from approximately 26% in 2022 to a projected level of more than 47% in 2050. The selection and large-scale deployment of alternative, sustainable energy carriers combined with further energy efficiency improvements and shift to more climate-friendly modes whenever is possible is critical.
As regards air pollution from transport activity, the EU Member States have significantly succeeded in reducing emissions of most of the air pollutants, with variation ranging from -88% to -49% due to introduction of policy measures and technological development. The greatest share of this progress is due to reduced exhaust pollutant emissions in the road transport sector. The combination of tighter air pollution emission standards and the development of advanced after-treatment systems have made the progress possible.
In the aviation and maritime sector, emissions of some air pollutants have also decreased while other challenges remain. Most significantly, emissions of sulphur oxides (SOx) have decreased in the maritime sector due to ambitious policies. However, further progress is needed, not least in terms of reducing black carbon (BC) particles. For aviation, the climate forcing effects of compounds other than CO2 are currently under scrutiny, with an estimated impact that can be two to four times higher compared to the one of CO2 alone.
To speed up the sustainable transition of Europe’s mobility system, continued public and private investment in innovation and technology along with implementation of existing EU legislation is required. For example, the revised Emissions Trading System (ETS) Directive which commits Member States to using all ETS revenues on climate action, energy transformation and addressing social challenges (up from 50% previously). The ETS Directive also directs more funding to the Innovation and Modernisation Funds. In this context, the Innovation Fund deploys around EUR 40 billion for the demonstration of innovative low-carbon technologies.
Such actions, paired with additional ambitious policy implementation aiming at containing inefficient transport demand and shifting transport activity to more sustainable transport modes, are needed in coming years to reduce climate, air quality and noise impacts of European transport.
Web report no. 01/2024
Title: Sustainability of Europe’s mobility systems
EN HTML: TH-01-24-007-EN-Q - ISBN: 978-92-9480-683-3 - doi: 10.2800/8560026