Purpose, Objectives and Key Question

The purpose of the project is to draw the big picture of how advanced renewable transport fuels (i.e., advanced biofuels and renewable liquid and gaseous transport fuels of non-biological origin) can contribute to the decarbonization of the transport sector.

The key question is:

• How much can advanced renewable transport fuels contribute to the decarbonization of the transport sector?

The audience is policy makers.

Activities

The activities include the following work packages:

• Key strategies in selected countries

Task participants from Brazil, China, Finland, Germany, Japan, Sweden and the United States provided detailed descriptions of GHG emissions from their road transport sectors and shared scenarios of how their countries intend to reduce these emissions.

• Fuel production technologies and costs

A number of experts from within the IEA Bioenergy TCP and the AMF TCP networks provided descriptions of biomass feedstock availability, technology status, biofuel production costs, future feedstock costs, future fuels GHG emissions, the role of policy, and engine and fuel compatibility.

• Country assessments

Experts of VTT assessed the possible future development of vehicle stocks of all kinds for Brazil, Germany and Sweden and calculated the future energy demand and associated GHG emissions. Scenarios were developed to show the effect of pushing the use of biofuels and electrofuels to the limits. This was compared to the national targets for GHG emissions from the transport sector.

• Implementation barriers

Results from AMF Task 59 regarding implementation barriers for advanced biofuels are summarized.

• Recommendations to policy makers

This section is still under development. It will draw conclusions from the project and provide actionable recommendations to policy makers.

Key Findings

The figure on the next page shows clearly the results for Germany.

The lines depict CO₂ emissions from road transport as calculated as tailpipe emissions (with biofuels and the use of electricity accounting for zero tailpipe emissions). The current policy is depicted in the base case scenario (light green line). If maximizing biofuel utilization, CO₂ emissions can be further reduced (dark green line). The effect of electrification alone is about as large as the effect of the current moderate biofuels utilization. With the maximum use of biofuels and electrification together, full decarbonization can almost be reached by 2050. Germany’s target for 2030 of reducing CO₂ emissions to around 30 to 40 million tons per year will be missed by far.
 

Fig. 1.     Scenarios of CO₂ Emissions from Road Transportation for Germany

Main Conclusions

Bringing the GHG emissions of the road transport sector down to zero by 2050 cannot be achieved by one measure alone.

Countries that deploy a set of different measures such as reducing transport demand, improving vehicle efficiency, and adding renewable energy carriers such as biofuels, e-fuels, renewable electricity and renewable hydrogen have the best chances to meet ambitious decarbonization goals.

Our assessment shows that biofuels contribute most to decarbonization now and up to 2030, 2040, or even 2050, depending on the country. In Germany and in the USA, efficiency gains become the main contributor after 2030. In Finland and Sweden, the impact of biofuels remains largest until around 2040 when the use of electric vehicles takes over. In Brazil, biofuels remain the largest contributor until 2050.

Publications

The findings of this project have been presented in a webinar and published in four distinct parts and together with a summary document:

• Summary Report
• Key Strategies in Selected Countries
• Production Technologies and Costs
• Scenarios and Contributions in Selected Countries
• Deployment Barriers and Policy Recommendations

All reports as well as the webinar presentations are available for download at https://iea-amf.org/content/projects/map_projects/58