EVENT RECAP: 2021 NDC-TIA “Decarbonising Transport” Workshop Series in China
Photo by GIZ and WRI
To decarbonize China’s transport sector, national, subnational, and corporates all have a role to play
China’s transport sector accounts for approximately 11% of total energy-related CO2 emissions. With further growing passenger and freight transport volumes, emissions both carbon and air pollutant emissions are expected to grow. Therefore, decarbonizing the transport sector and bending the growing emissions curve are important for China’s goals of achieving CO2 emission peaking before 2030 and carbon neutrality before 2060. The climate targets were announced by Chinese president Xi Jinping during the General Debate of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly on 22 September 2020 and are reflected in China’s updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on 28 October 2021.
To ensure the attainment of the climate targets, China is now actively developing the “1+N policy system for carbon dioxide peaking and carbon neutrality” on both the national level and the subnational level. “1” refers to the overarching guideline for emission reduction, that is, “Working guidance for carbon dioxide peaking and carbon neutrality in full and faithful implementation of the new development philosophy” released on 24 October. “N” refers to the “Action plan for carbon dioxide peaking before 2030” released on 26 October 2021 and relevant action plans for high-emitting sectors. At present, “N action plans” on the national level and the “1+N policy systems” on the subnational level are still under development.
As stated in the “Action plan for carbon dioxide peaking before 2030,” the goal of the transport sector is to “keep the growth of carbon emissions in the transportation domain within an appropriate range.” This indicates that unlike other sectors such as power and industry, China’s transport emissions are not likely to peak before 2030. In fact, decarbonising China’s transport sector is confronted by challenges such as increasing transport demand, the involvement of multiple government departments, lack of statistical system, and immature technologies in aviation and maritime shipping and associated high abatement costs.
To effectively cut transport sector emissions, it is important to have sectoral targets, strategies, policies, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems in place. To contribute international knowledge and best practice to the development of climate policies aiming to lower emissions in China’s transport sector, the National Determined Contributions Transport Initiative For Asia (NDC-TIA) project organized various workshops as part of the “National Determined Contributions Transport Initiative for Asia 2021 Event Series – Decarbonising Transport”. The event series took place from October to December 2021 and included following themes:
“European Green Deal and the Fit for 55 Package from a Transport Perspective,” October 20, Beijing
Workshop on “Climate Targets and Impacts in the Transport Sector in the European Union and China“, October 29, Beijing
“Planning and Major Policies for Peaking Carbon Dioxide Emissions from Transportation and Carbon Neutrality“, November 23, Beijing
“Provincial transport related GHG decarbonization experience exchanges”, November 24, Beijing
Workshop photos of the “National Determined Contributions Transport Initiative for Asia 2021 Event Series – Decarbonising Transport”.
The event series had successfully brought together officials from the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of the People’s Republic of China (MEE), the Guangdong Department of Ecology and Environment, the German Embassy in Beijing, the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China (EUCCC), experts from the EU and China government affiliated research institutes to exchange views on China’s transport decarbonization.
Discussions and key takeaways from the four workshops demonstrate that to decarbonize China’s transport emissions, national, subnational, and corporates all have a role to play.
It is time to realign the national policies with the newly minted climate targets.
In the workshop on “European Green Deal and the Fit for 55 Package from a Transport Perspective,” Dr. Günter Hörmandinger, Deputy Executive Director of Agora Verkehrswende introduced recent updates on EU climate targets and how policies and legislations were recast to keep the alignment. To achieve the long-term goal of net zero greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by 2050, the EU aims to reduce GHG emissions by at least 55% in reference to the 1990 levels by 2030, pushing ahead the previously set 40% target. To align EU policies with the 55% emission reduction target, the European Commission has adopted the Fit for 55 Package, including revising existing legislations and developing new proposals. Transport related policies include but are not limited to:
Promotion of electric vehicles and vehicle CO2 standards: The EU aims to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles from new vehicle sales by 2035. It will also revise the CO2 emission standards for passenger cars and light commercial vehicles.
Renewable energy in the transport sector: The EU will recast the Directive on Renewable Energy (RED III) to further reduce GHG intensity of transport fuels (13%), and facilitate the adoption of sustainable fuels (advanced biofuels and green power-to-x fuels) in aviation and maritime shipping.
Price setting for CO2: The Commission also hopes to reduce emissions from transport by incorporating maritime shipping into the existing ETS system and including road transport in a new emissions trading system (ETS2).
Like E.U., with the announcement of 30/60 climate targets, China’s policies are being re-examined to be compatible with these targets. These policies are embodied in the “1+N” policy packages on the national level and the subnational level, in which green and low-carbon transportation is also a critical component. The workshop on “Climate Targets and Impacts in the Transport Sector in the European Union and China” and “Planning and Major Policies for Peaking Carbon Dioxide Emissions from Transportation and Carbon Neutrality” coalesced around the following recommendations:
First, advanced actions—including more ambitious vehicle electrification targets and energy efficiency standards—can reduce 74% of climate pollutant emissions from the transport sector. Road transport accounts for approximately 87% of total transport emissions. Based on the study of “Opportunities and pathways to decarbonize China’s transportation sector during the fourteenth Five-Year Plan period and beyond”, which was conducted under the NDC-TIA project, vehicle electrification and energy efficiency (and GHG emission standards) carry the greatest potentials to decarbonize the road transport sector:
Electrification (in line with the expansion of renewable energy capacity) is the most effective way to achieve long-term decarbonization goals. China has achieved a remarkable progress in promoting new energy vehicles (NEV). The transition to low-new energy heavy-duty trucks will also be one of key tasks in the future.
Based on current international experience, energy efficiency and GHG emission standards are powerful policy tools for reducing carbon emissions from the transport sector. To date, China has established a relatively mature energy efficiency standard system, including the world’s first energy intensity standard for battery electric vehicles. China’s Stage-5 fuel consumption standard for passenger cars enacted in 2021 requires the average fuel consumption of passenger cars is forced to reach 4L/100km by 2025. China’s Stage-6 fuel consumption standard (under development and to be enacted from 2026 to 2030) will address two major issues: how to continuously reduce the fuel consumption of internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles and how to promote the adoption of new energy vehicles.
Second, the non-road transport sector cannot be ignored. The low carbon transformation of aviation and maritime shipping sectors is very important, considering the rapid upward growth trend and long investment and research and development (R&D) cycles when it comes to e. g. propulsion technology adoption, and infrastructure construction. For example, emissions from aviation had increased most rapidly, compared with other transport modes, over the past decade. The country’s aviation sector in 2018 accounted for about 13% of global commercial aviation CO2 emissions (EU 18%, United States 24%). Because the per capita emissions are still low (China 0.09t CO2, United Kingdom 0.86t, United States 0.57t), aviation emission will continue growing rapidly, and it is expected that Chinese aviation sector CO2 emissions could quadruple by 2050.
The decarbonization priorities can be planned for the aviation sector: 1. developing ultra-efficient future aircrafts, 2. using sustainable aviation fuels, 3. inventing alternative propulsion technologies and increasing the efficiency of air traffic management and ground operations.
Cutting the emissions from the shipping industry, alternative fuels such as biodiesel, methanol, lignin fuels, and ammonia can be considered by the country.
“Local” can take the lead
“Local” governments have different policy making jurisdictions from the central governments—for example, local governments can set more ambitious decarbonization targets, and policies such as mode shift are more appropriate to be designed and implemented on the local level. Further, considering different local conditions such as socio-economic development structure, administrative capacities and resource endowment, local governments need to develop their own climate targets and action plans.
Introduced by Christian Hochfeld, Executive Director of Agora Verkehrswende, Germany committed to achieving climate neutrality by 2045, five years earlier than the EU. To meet the target, Germany needs stronger policy incentives. For example, by 2045, the transport sector would achieve near-zero emissions by means of a significant reduction in energy consumption and the large-scale electrification. The country also aims to accelerate power sector decarbonization by generating 80% of its electricity from renewable energy by 2030, a rise from 65% for 2030.
Similar to Germany, the Guangdong province, as a highly developed region in China, has the potential of enhanced ambition on transport decarbonization. The workshop on “Provincial transport-related GHG decarbonization experience exchanges” showed that:
Concrete sectoral emission reduction targets are needed. Like in many emerging economies, the statistical system in China is not full-fledged to enable reliable carbon emission forecast modelling. At present, only policy actions, rather than carbon emission reduction targets, are covered by the “1+N” policy packages. With reliable data and statistics, the Guangdong province has the chance to become a national frontrunner to establish an emission reduction target.
Vehicle electrification should be prioritized. The Guangdong province is leading China’s vehicle electrification. The total NEV stock in the province reached 0.8 million by mid-2020, almost tripling the 0.25 million targets set by Guangdong 13th Five-Year Energy-Saving and Emission Reduction Plan (2016-2020). In particular the city of Shenzhen is a forerunner when it comes to NEV adoption. The city has already achieved the full electrification of its urban bus and taxi fleet, and aims to achieve the full electrification of urban delivery vehicles and ride-hailing vehicles and the adoption of 0.78 million electric private cars before 2025. This development is supported by the province’s ambition to clean its energy grid where already today, hydropower accounts for a share of about 30% of total electricity consumption. The province can increase the efforts to electrify transport by considering a timeline for the phase out of ICE vehicles, promoting heavy-duty vehicle electrification, and accelerating vehicle electrification in medium- and small-sized cities (76% of NEVs currently located in large cities such as Shenzhen and Guangzhou).
Mode shift and behavior changes have a role to play: the Guangdong province has experienced rapid motorization, unlike other Chinese cities, the medium- and small-sized cities in Guangdong are heavily relying on private cars— the mode share of private cars out of motorized modes (including private cars, public transit, and taxis, but excluding walking and biking) in some cities have reached 70% to 80%. The preliminary study indicates that effectively managing the motor vehicle growth through mode shift and behavior changes can be a viable near-term decarbonization measure. This mode shift can be achieved through travel demand management policies (such as car ownership restriction, parking policies), integrated intra-city and inter-city transit system (through Mobility-as-a-Service MaaS), investments in rail and waterway infrastructure, and pricing rationalization.
Strengthened commitments from the private sector is also essential
Beside government actions, decarbonization commitments from the private sector are instrumental to build the momentum.
As indicated by the workshop on “Climate Targets and Impacts in the Transport Sector in the European Union and China,” globally, the private sector is increasingly embracing the low-carbon transition. For example, Scania has set science-based targets that aim to reach 50% CO2 reduction from operations by 2025 (baseline 2015), and advocates all new trucks sold must be fossil free by 2040. In 2018, Maersk committed to net-zero CO2 emissions by 2050, and the company will operate the world’s first carbon neutral liner vessel by 2023. Transport is an important economic sector in China, and the corporate-level decarbonization commitments will facilitate the country’s attainment of the 2030 and 2060 climate targets.
The workshop participants made clear that it will require concrete carbon emission reduction target, clear policies, and investments and clear policies and technology pathways to reach the common goal of zero emission transport and eventually to align the sector with the goals of the Paris Agreement, the EU’s 55% emission reduction goal, and China’s 2030/2060 climate targets. The participants agreed that more and intensified dialogues among different stakeholders including policy makers, researchers and the industry are needed.
Author(s): Lulu Xue
