Getting zero-emission vans and trucks on the road | Kick-off Session

Why is getting zero-emission vans and trucks on the road important?

The entire transport sector needs to fully decarbonize by 2050 to meet the Paris Agreement climate targets. Most discussions of zero-emission vehicles focus on automobiles and mass transit, and their market is developing rapidly. Yet there is one segment that is often overlooked. Freight trucks— urban delivery vans, regional trucks, long-haul tractor-trailers, and other commercial vehicles – represent an enormous and timely opportunity for transport decarbonization. Unless current trends change radically, emissions from road freight vehicles, which represent over 60% of freight transport emissions, could double by 2050 compared to 2015—making Paris Agreement targets all the harder to meet. Precisely because freight vehicles are relatively small in number and large in carbon contributions and other emissions, getting zero-emission freight vehicles (ZEFVs) on the road will produce an outsize impact on CO2 reduction And still, while the demand for ZEFV seems to be there, as testifying by the action campaign jointly led by TDA, The Climate Group/EV100 and CALSTART /Drive to Zero , their availability is still lacking or at least lagging in terms of broad range. So, based on a market economy logic, the challenge is to explore what is needed to match supply and demand on that particular field. With this in mind, the identification of a burning question was quite easy: How do we get more zero-emission vans and trucks on the road?