The Development of a Bottom-up Transportation Model for Assessment of Policies on Energy and Emissions
Creators: Haider, Minza
Publisher: name: University of Alberta Library
Year: 2023

<p>The increasing anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have led to the implementation of various mitigation policies in order to limit the adverse impacts of climate change. However, it becomes challenging as the growth in energy demand outbalances the GHG mitigation measures. The transportation sector is predominantly reliant on fossil fuels and is responsible for 24% of direct GHG emissions globally.<br>
This study assesses low-carbon energy transition pathways for road transport in a fossil fuel-dependent jurisdiction. In this research, a novel assessment framework is developed to analyze long-term energy transitions in the road transport sector considering sectorial activities, vehicle costs, market shares, energy use, and GHG emissions to 2050. The vehicle categories include cars, sport-utility vehicles, pickup trucks, vans, school buses, intercity transit buses, urban transit buses, and light, medium, and heavy freight trucks. Each fuel&#39;s full energy supply chain was modelled, including resource extraction, conversion, transmission and distribution, and fuelling, allowing for final and primary energy analysis. The framework was applied to the road transport sector in Alberta, Canada, one of the most emission-intensive regions in Canada. Nine scenarios on the effect of carbon prices, zero-emission vehicle mandates, and financial incentives on vehicle costs and market shares, energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and social costs to 2050 were evaluated. The findings show that carbon price and zero-emission vehicle incentives do not effectively increase the market adoption of zero-emission vehicles on their own; zero-emission vehicle mandates are needed to transition the sector to zero-emission vehicles fully. It was found that the increase in carbon price from $0/tonne to $350/tonne increases the market share of zero-emission vehicles by 11% in 2050 and incentivizing the zero-emission vehicles increases the share by 9% in 2050. Assessing the current policies in Alberta, including $170/tonne carbon price by 2030 and zero-emission vehicle sales mandate in current policy scenario, it was found that these policy measures resulted in a 67% increase in the share of zero-emission vehicles in 2050. However, when the ZEV sales mandate was applied to all sectors, it resulted in a 90% increase in the market share of zero-emission vehicles in 2050. The market penetration potential for hydrogen fuel cell vehicles is lower than battery electric vehicles in all categories. The system-wide GHG emission footprints of hydrogen and battery electric vehicles are significantly below conventional gasoline and diesel vehicles in all cases. It was found that the GHG emission footprint of hydrogen vehicles supplied by auto-thermal reforming with 91% carbon capture was lower than for battery electric vehicles powered by a primarily natural gas-based power grid (53.6% and 83.2% natural gas-based electricity generation in 2030 and 2050). The findings on the effectiveness of carbon prices vs incentives vs vehicle mandates should be considered by government policymakers who are aiming to reduce GHG emissions from road transport and will inform infrastructure planners and other energy stakeholders.</p>