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Journal Article

Life-cycle impacts from different decarbonization pathways for the European car fleet

Authors
/persons/resource/dirnaichner

Dirnaichner,  Alois
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

/persons/resource/Rottoli

Rottoli,  Marianna
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Sacchi,  Romain
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/Sebastian.Rauner

Rauner,  Sebastian
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

Cox,  Brian
External Organizations;

Mutel,  Christopher Lucien
External Organizations;

Bauer,  Christian
External Organizations;

/persons/resource/Gunnar.Luderer

Luderer,  Gunnar
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research;

External Ressource
No external resources are shared
Fulltext (public)

26786oa.pdf
(Publisher version), 938KB

Supplementary Material (public)
There is no public supplementary material available
Citation

Dirnaichner, A., Rottoli, M., Sacchi, R., Rauner, S., Cox, B., Mutel, C. L., Bauer, C., Luderer, G. (2022): Life-cycle impacts from different decarbonization pathways for the European car fleet. - Environmental Research Letters, 17, 4, 044009.
https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac4fdb


Cite as: https://publications.pik-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_26786
Abstract
For light-duty vehicles (LDVs), alternative powertrains and liquid fuels based on renewable electricity are competing options considered by policymakers and stakeholders for achieving necessary CO2 emission reductions in the transport sector. While the urgency of climate change and the need to reach mitigation targets are well understood, system-wide implications along other sustainability dimensions need further exploration. We integrate a detailed transport system model into an integrated assessment framework and couple it with prospective life cycle impact analysis. This allows to assess different technological pathways of the European LDV fleet until 2050 for a comprehensive set of environmental and resource depletion indicators. Results indicate that greenhouse gas emissions drop significantly in all mitigation scenarios. However, impacts increase in several non-climate change impact categories even with fully renewable electricity supply. Additional impacts arise from the production of battery and fuel-cell components, and from a significant rise in electricity demand, most prominently for synthetic fuels. We consequently find that changes in mobility life-styles and in the relevant industrial processes are paramount to reduce environmental impacts from a climate-friendly LDV fleet across all categories.