We all have to help to decarbonise transport in Europe

Welcome back to Shifting Perspectives, a newsletter from LinkedIn News Europe. Every month, we share expert insights about a topic that could deeply impact the future of the European economy and labour markets.

In this edition, we take a look at the sustainability efforts of a highly critical industry that is also one of the hardest to decarbonise. Making Europe's mobility system more "green" will prove crucial to reach the EU's climate ambitions.

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By Pieter Cranenbroek , Senior News Editor, LinkedIn News

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a ship… with wings?

Mere weeks ago, the MT Chemical Challenger, a vessel from Netherlands-based shipping company Chemship BV , became the first chemical tanker in the world with "turbo sails".?

Installed on both sides of the ship, the aluminium constructions make it look like it has wings. The sails should make the vessel more fuel-efficient, leading to an estimated 10% drop in carbon emissions.

A few months earlier, the Laura Maersk had become the world's first container vessel operating on green methanol, a low-carbon fuel, as part of 马士基 's fleet.

Making Europe's mobility system more sustainable will prove crucial for reaching the EU's climate ambitions. But decarbonising transport will require teamwork.?

What's needed , according to the European Environment Agency , are "decisive policies, smart investments and changes in demand". Policymakers, transport companies and their customers and consumers all have to do their part to help with the transition.?

Let's see how that is going.

Smart investments

Transport is at the heart of economic activity. It provides access to goods as well as key public services, such as healthcare and education. But it's also responsible for about a quarter of the EU's total greenhouse gas emissions.

For the shipping industry, globally responsible for more than 2% of total carbon emissions, turbo sails and vessels powered by greener fuels will contribute to reducing its environmental impact.?

While the first technique is still being tested, major shipping companies including Maersk, 达飞轮船 , COSCO SHIPPING Europe and HMM have already ordered more than 100 ships running on methanol.

"We are very early in the transition and spend a lot of effort understanding technologies and transition paths across our business," writes Morten Bo Christiansen , Senior Vice-President and Head of Energy Transition at Maersk, in an email to LinkedIn News Europe.

"Green fuels will be significantly more expensive than fossil fuels in the short and medium term. So green fuel producers look to their customers – shipping lines like Maersk - for long term offtake agreements."

As in shipping, greener fuels appear to be the most viable option in the short run to decrease emissions from flying. A total of 60 companies across the aviation value chain, including 20 airlines, have committed to achieving a 10% sustainable aviation fuels (SAFs) blend by 2030.?

The first transatlantic flight powered entirely by SAFs, a Virgin Atlantic service between London and New York which flew in? November 2023, emitting around 70% less carbon, makes the integration of greener fuels a realistic prospect.

Road transport, meanwhile, is expected to lead the pack and switch to more sustainable vehicles more quickly, aided by EU legislators agreeing to phase out internal combustion engines and most carmakers aiming to electrify their entire catalogue by 2030.

"Besides embracing technological changes and modal shift, transport and logistics companies stand to benefit from lower carbon emissions by further optimising their processes and operations," writes Teodora Serafimova , Editorial Board Member at Green Mobility Magazine .

"For example, smart mobility systems which make efficient use of data on mobility patterns and integrate multiple transport options can help to improve network management, traffic congestion, accessibility and environmental performance."

Decisive policies

While it's up to transport businesses to meet their sustainability targets, policymakers can do a lot to speed up this process.

Regulation, such as the ban on the sale of new petrol- and diesel-powered vehicles from 2035, is providing clarity to businesses about the direction of travel.

Together with government subsidies that brought down costs, electric vehicle (EV) adoption is beating expectations and could reach 55% of total global vehicle sales by 2030, according to an 安永 report.

Indeed, a good way to make people switch to greener options is to, well, give them greener options - or make those alternatives more appealing.

"Regulation is critical because it levels the playing field, by creating a framework all players in the industry need to adhere to," says Christiansen. "Regulatory-enforced emission-reduction becomes the norm, not a ‘nice to have’.

"This pushes companies to find solutions, and to partner and work together across the supply chain to co-create solutions to reduce emissions, for mutual benefit. In turn, this helps scale, drive costs down, accelerate adoption."

In this respect, Christiansen applauds the recent EU Emissions Trading System Directive, effective from January 2024, which puts a price on greenhouse gas emissions and requires all companies to comply.

He says that it reduces the green premium that customers must pay and therefore stimulates demand for the green solutions.

Serafimova agrees that policies should focus on getting users to pay the true environmental cost of transport.

"The provision of cost-reflective price signals is considered the most effective incentive mechanism to nudge users towards more sustainable transport choices," notes Serafimova.?

"Such incentives can include carbon pricing, taxation, and infrastructure charging and should be complemented by improved information to users."

Changes in demand

Another crucial element in the decarbonisation process is the role of consumers and businesses in other industries.

"Commercial uptake of low-emission logistics is critical for the success of the green transition," says Christiansen.?

That might mean customers accepting higher prices for greener transport. But most companies will be under pressure to become more sustainable, which may make it more competitive for consumers.

"Many of our customers have net-zero targets themselves. We are working together with our customers to co-create low-emissions solutions and to develop a credible path for them to decarbonise their supply chains."

Businesses can help each other out to reduce emissions across the board, including transport emissions, simply by changing their behaviour, adds Serafimova.

"Companies across the entire economy are recognising the value of adopting corporate sustainability initiatives, such as the electrification of company cars and the reduction of business trips as a means to cut emissions," she says.

"Limiting the number of business trips or the total number of employees travelling per business trip has proven to be a highly effective measure of reducing transport-related emissions."

But solutions could come from outside the industry as well.?

Serafimova suggests that the construction sector could play a key role. By equipping future residential and office buildings with chargers, builders could decrease range anxiety and boost EV uptake.

In a similar vein, 星巴克 and 沃尔沃汽车 have partnered up to install EV chargers at its US locations every 160km.?

"The task of reducing emissions in our hard-to-abate business and transitioning to renewable energy is not one we - or any other company - can do alone," says Christiansen.

"Working across the ecosystem is critical for advancing on the emissions-reduction journey."

Join the conversation in the comments, or in a post using #ShiftingPerspectives.

We asked professionals in Europe how they are commuting to work and what would encourage them to travel to work in a more sustainable way.?

Four out of 10 respondents said that the biggest obstacle to using green modes of transport where they live is the lack of adequate infrastructure. A further 30% of voters blame the additional travel time alternative transport would take them to get to the workplace, while 20% claimed that public transport costs too much.

Joanna Koter , human geographer, says for her it's not about the affordability but about the frequency of public transport services that put people off:

"In my hometown (Toruń in Poland, a city of a little under 200,000 citizens) public transport is definitely affordable, the main drawback though is the frequency of trams and buses. Sometimes I come home by train and then I have to wait 40 minutes for the earliest bus that can take me home from the train station. A lot of people in this situation would ask for someone to get picked up, or just drive all the way instead of taking the train."

Chris Hodge , product design engineer, has tried out different transport options and assessed which gave him "the biggest value add":

"I have been fortunate to be able to try and enjoy just about every kind of commute and I love experimenting, for my commute into London I settled on a 1hr 15 minute cycle ride each way with panniers carrying laptop and clothes, this was for 2 days a week in the office. Previous trials were motorbike (50 miserable stressful minutes) and Brompton-train-Brompton (1hr 15mins if the trains weren’t cancelled)"

What's the transport infrastructure like where you live? Have you switched to more sustainable ways of commuting recently? Join the conversation.

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Pieter Cranenbroek , Senior News Editor, LinkedIn News Europe