© Reuters. The EC admits “great challenges” for transport to comply with the Green Pact
Brussels, Nov 17 (.) .- The director general of Mobility and Transport (MOVE) of the European Commission (EC), Henrik Hololei, recognized today that the transport industry faces “great challenges” to comply with the European Green Deal (PVE) and achieve net zero carbon emissions by lacking “pre-prepared solutions”.
This was admitted this Wednesday in a colloquium of the European Business Summit focused on the perspectives of change towards sustainable transport, in which the senior director of vehicles and electric mobility of the European Federation of Transport and Environment (T&E) also participated, Julia Poliscanova, and representatives of the sector.
In Hololei’s opinion, for the transport industry to comply with the Green Deal and achieve progress in the commitments made by the European Union (EU) in the Paris Agreement, the sector must “radically” change its paradigm on issues such as sources of Energy.
“The transport sector is responsible for 25% of greenhouse gas emissions, a figure that until the pandemic was only growing. With the PVE, the sector needs to cut emissions by 90% by 2050. This is a great challenge, especially considering that there are no previously prepared solutions, “said the CEO.
For its part, Poliscanova lamented that Europe has been “too slow” to deploy neutral or zero-emission technology and that for years it has “relied too much” on diesel to achieve its environmental goals.
“We needed a ‘Dieselgate’ to overcome that addiction and finally switch to electricity,” recalled the director of T&E, referring to the scandal of polluting emissions from Volkswagen vehicles (DE 🙂 in 2015.
Despite the self-criticism, Poliscanova applauded the progress made in road transport, which in her opinion presents positive results on its way to a sustainable model.
“The good news is that now things are starting to work in road transport. This year, one in five cars bought in Europe is expected to have a plug. Five times what we had in 2019. That’s a huge market growth, “he celebrated.
In order to adapt the transport industry to the objectives of the PVE, the Community Executive launched last year the Strategy for Smart and Sustainable Mobility, a roadmap with specific measures for the sector to drastically reduce its gas emissions greenhouse effect.
“We must significantly increase the efficiency of the industry and make it sustainable, for which we must continue to invest in the European single market. We also need a radical change in the way we power vehicles. And it is clear that much of this is related to electrification, “Hololei said.
However, the decarbonisation of the sector encounters a major stumbling block in air and maritime transport, which, since they cannot be electrified, cross more expensive roads towards net zero, unlike the case of railways and roads.
“Here electrification is not an option in the short and medium term. And who knows if in the long term. That is why a very important element is investment in sustainable fuels,” argued the CEO.
Ultimately, the community club’s aspirations to reduce its carbon footprint go through investing in innovation and technology in the transportation industry.
“Digitization and ‘smart’ solutions are another key element. Through technologies such as artificial intelligence we can significantly increase efficiency and make different modes of transport work better and complement each other,” concluded Hololei.
(More information about the European Union at euroefe.euractiv.es)
