JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Special Issue Composites for mobility - May 2020 - 20

TRENDS Europe

BEVs present the advantage of
lowering average CO2 emissions in
Europe
When considering cradle-to-grave
analyses, the figure below highlights
smaller average CO2 emissions in Europe compared to thermal vehicles
(Figure 5), even if the situation varies
significantly from one country to another (depending on the ways electricity is produced). From a regulatory
point of view, carmakers benefit from
advantages to develop electric vehicles, as the CO2 reduction taken into
account to reach the targets favours
electric vehicles beyond their real impact on CO2 reduction.
Are BEVs the only solution
to lower CO2 emissions?
The development of BEVs is hampered by many barriers. As for the
objective of lowering CO2 emissions,
BEVs will have to face the competition of other solutions.
- An efficient solution would be to
reduce the average weight of cars,
for instance by removing the heaviest and therefore most polluting
cars from the market. SUVs are specifically targeted because this segment exploded these past ten years
and accounted for almost 40%
of the European market in 2019.
According to the International
Energy Agency (IEA), the negative
impact of SUVs on C02 emissions
has been 5 times more important
than the positive impact of electrified cars (Figure 6) between 2010
and 2018. In France, some public
players are pushing the idea of a
"malus" tax based on the weight of
cars in order to offset the European
"bonus" granted to manufacturers
of heavy passenger cars in the calculation of CO2 targets since 2009.
- Another solution is the development of more efficient thermal
engines, for instance new types of
compression ignition engines developed from diesel engine tech-

Fig. 5: Compared CO2 emissions depending on energy
modes and countries
Source: The International
Council of Clean
Transportation (ICCT)

Fig. 6: Change in global CO2
emissions by energy sector,
2010-2018
Source: International
Energy Agency (IEA)

Fig. 7: Average CO2 emissions from new passenger
cars registered in Europe
Source: European
Environment Agency (EEA)

nology. In nearly ten years, the
production of diesel passenger cars
in Europe dropped from an average
47% in 2010 to 36% in 2019. This
is not the case for light utility vehicles, which remain for the most part
equipped with diesel engines, with
a constant rate over 93% of the production. The decline of diesel has
been particularly strong since the
"Dieselgate" in 2015. Today, only
Geely (with Volvo), Tata (JaguarLand Rover) and Suzuki still produce more than 50% of their new

jec composites magazine / SPECIAL ISSUE Mobility / May 2020

cars as diesel in Europe. On the
other end of the spectrum, Toyota
completely phased out new diesel vehicles. Less than 50% of the
vehicles produced by all the other
groups are equipped with diesel engines (with an average of 35 to 40%
of their production). Consequently,
the average CO2 emissions from
passenger cars registered in Europe
have raised again since 2017 (Figure
7). New types of compression ignition engines can efficiently contribute to lowering CO2 emissions.

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - Special Issue Composites for mobility - May 2020

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