Elsevier

Energy Policy

Volume 35, Issue 1, January 2007, Pages 433-451
Energy Policy

Energy and transport in comparison: Immaterialisation, dematerialisation and decarbonisation in the EU15 between 1970 and 2000

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2005.11.031Get rights and content

Abstract

This article compares the development of transport and energy use with a focus on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the EU15 countries between 1960 and 2000, and separately by each individual EU country between 1970 and 2000. Based on a review on the literature, immaterialisation can be defined as the reduction of energy intensity and transport intensity; dematerialisation can be defined as the reduction in carbon intensity of energy production and the carbon intensity of transport; decarbonisation can be defined as the reduction in (total and transport) carbon intensity of the whole economy. Although there is a clear pattern of reduction in energy intensity of the economy and carbon intensity of energy production, a similar pattern cannot be found in transport. Neither the transport intensity of the economy nor the carbon intensity of transport has been reduced. In particular, freight transport intensity has grown between 1985 and 2000. Data presented by country have shown even more variation. The EU15 countries were aggregated into six groups by cluster analysis to establish the different patterns on each of the three measures. It is concluded that the EU15 countries will have problems in achieving the EU White Paper target of decoupling transport growth from economic growth and the Kyoto target of reducing total CO2 emissions by 8% from the 1990 level between 2008 and 2012. However, there are some weak signals suggesting a more sustainable passenger transport system.

Introduction

Concerns over the environmental impacts of transport have become central to EU policy, both in terms of seeking a sustainable transport policy (Commission of the European Communities, 2001a) and in the broader sustainable development strategy (Commission of the European Communities, 2001b). The main objective has been to achieve continued economic growth, but with a lower transport contribution—this is the decoupling effect. It has long been recognised that transport growth in both the passenger and freight sectors have continued in line with growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (Fig. 1). But the key question discussed in the literature is whether that link can and should be broken (Banister and Stead, 2002; Gilbert and Nadeau, 2002; Tapio, 2005). This decoupling is a crucial element in achieving sustainable transport.

As can be seen from Fig. 1, there has been a close link between GDP growth and the growth in passenger travel and energy use in transport, apart from a slight divergence in the 1960s and the 1970s. By the 1980s, passenger transport had “caught up” again with GDP. A second observation is that energy use in transport remained between the passenger and freight growth curves up to 1985. Since then it has grown at a substantially higher rate than both passenger and freight transport, suggesting that more energy is being used per unit of distance or per tonne km.

The EU White Paper recognised that transport energy consumption has increased and that 28% of CO2 emissions were transport related (2000) (CEC, 2001a, p. 10). In 1990, 739 million tonnes of CO2 were released from the transport sector, rising to 900 million tonnes in 2000. Further substantial increases are expected in the next decade (1113 million tonnes by 2010). Road transport accounts for 84% of the 2000 figure, and the total will increase substantially with the enlargement of the EU, even though the level of motorisation in the new EU states is lower. Nevertheless, the White Paper was optimistic and three types of policy options were described (CEC, 2001a, p. 11 and annex) to reduce transport emissions: Option A) pricing; Option B) pricing and efficiency increases; and Option C) pricing and efficiency increases, and the promotion of alternative modes and targeted investment in the Trans European Networks. The recommendations of the White Paper were built on Option C where the market shares for the individual modes return to the 1998 levels in 2010 as a result of the measures set out in the document.

According to the White Paper, ‘by implementing the 60-odd measures set out in the White Paper there will be a marked break in the link between transport growth and economic growth, although without there being any need to restrict the mobility of people and goods’ (CEC, 2001a, p. 11). This conclusion seems optimistic in the belief that the policy measures being proposed—principally fair infrastructure pricing, the harmonisation of taxation, the completion of the Trans-European rail network, and investment in technologies such as radionavigation and intermodal integration—are sufficient to achieve real change. The associated analysis predicted GDP to increase at 3% per annum (+43% over the period 1998–2010), but the corresponding increases in passenger kilometres and tonne kilometres would be 24% and 38%, respectively. The decoupling of the relative intensity of passenger and freight transport would take place provided that GDP growth is greater than transport growth.

One means by which a clearer understanding of the future direction of energy intensity in transport can be obtained is to look back over the past 40 years to explore the trends in travel and energy use at the European Union level. As can be seen from Fig. 2, the average distance travelled by each person in the EU15 countries grew from about 4000 km in 1960 to 12,700 km in 2000, an increase of 3.17 times. The increase in the numbers of trips explains about 20% of this growth, but the main change has been in the length of journeys. This in turn is explained by the huge growth in travel distance by car (nearly 5 times), with the use of the bus and rail remaining relatively constant (Fig. 2). Air travel has also increased from near to zero to about 750 km per person per year. The picture for freight transport is similar, but less dramatic in its overall growth (Fig. 3). It has risen from about 3000 tonne-km per capita in 1960 to over 8000 tonne-km per capita in 2000, an increase of 2.75 times. Again, the explanation is that each tonne of goods is being moved further, principally by road (+3.75 times growth) and by sea (+3 times growth). Again, the figures for the other three forms of motorised transport are relatively stable and small.

The overall picture demonstrates the difficulties of trying to reduce energy intensity in the transport sector, as the growth rates over the last 40 years have been so high. Transport is also almost wholly dependent on oil for energy, and the rise in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is causing increased concern. At present there is no technological solution available to reduce CO2 emissions, so the only way to reduce transport's contribution to global warming is to reduce its carbon dependency through the increased use of alternative fuels, greater efficiency in fuel use, increased occupancy and load factors, and through reducing the distances travelled.

In this paper, we compare the carbon intensity of the EU transport sector with that of the total economy over the period from 1970 to 2000. Data has been assembled for each of the 15 EU countries to 2004 for CO2 emissions in transport and the economy as a whole, with a view to seeing whether any patterns can be observed. Cluster analysis is used to group the 15 countries according to the changes that have occurred in the key variables over time.

Section snippets

Data reliability

In the following analysis, passenger traffic and freight transport volume data are taken from Eurostat Energy & Transport in Figures (2003) statistics, and GDP and CO2 emissions data are from IEA (2003). GDP is measured in purchasing power parities (GDPppp) to control for the effects of currency fluctuations.

The major problem of the IEA CO2 emission data is that the emissions of passenger transport and freight transport are not separated. They are only separated by fuel and by road and other

Patterns of decoupling within EU15

Fig. 5 shows in a dendrogram the cluster analysis groupings for the EU15 countries in terms of immaterialisation, dematerialisation and decarbonisation. The figure can be read from left to right. Initially, all countries are separate and the Furthest neighbour method starts clustering similar cases together. Based on the dendrogram, Austria and Italy are close to each other as well as Belgium, the UK and Germany. In this phase there are twelve clusters. In the ‘next phase’,6

Summary of results

Three different measures have been used in this analysis of trends taken from Eurostat data for the EU15 countries over a 30-year period. Each of the measures shows the differences between total primary energy supply, overall and transport CO2 emissions, transport volumes for freight and passengers and GDP. The groupings (including the sensitivity analysis in Appendix A) are robust and demonstrate the different paths that the EU15 countries have followed over time, and their responses to the

Acknowledgements

The article is a mutual product of the Collisions of Nature and Culture in Transport Policy (TRAPO) project and the Eco-efficiency Now and in the Future project. Academy of Finland and National Technological Agency of Finland are gratefully acknowledged for funding.

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