Urban Electric Mobility Initiative

The Action Platform: Urban Electric Mobility Initiative (UEMI) was initiated by UN-Habitat and the SOLUTIONS project and launched at the UN Climate Summit in September 2014 in New York. The UEMI aims to contribute significantly to the overall goal of limiting the increase in global mean temperature to two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by decreasing urban CO2 emissions globally. As one of the Action Areas of the UN Climate Summit the UEMI aims to boost the share of electric vehicles in individual mobility (2-3 wheelers and light duty vehicles) and integrate electric mobility into a wider concept of sustainable urban transport that achieves a 30 percent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in urban areas by 2030:
UN-Habitat Action Platform
UN-Habitat Communique Mobility

Sustainable energy and mobility can make positive contributions to a number of policy objectives, nationally and locally. In particular in cities there is a great potential to create synergies between for example safety, air quality, productivity, access and climate change mitigation. A UEMI resource centre will provide opportunities for direct collaboration on projects focusing on sustainable urban mobility and the role emobility can play in it. The UEMI will pool expertise, facilitate exchange and initiate implementation oriented actions. UN-Habitat, the Wuppertal Institute and the Climate Action Implementation Facility jointly host the resource centre for the Urban Electric Mobility Initiative, aiming to bridge the gap between urban energy and transport and boosting sustainable transport and urban emobility.

UEMI Position Paper on Opportunities and Priorities for Electric Mobility
Electric mobility in all forms has the potential to make an important contribution a low-carbon development pathway for transport. To ensure e-mobility solutions are properly integrated in a wider sustainable development concept, the Urban Electric Mobility Initiative (UEMI) aims to assist cities in developing and implementing packages of policies in infrastructure. The UEMI position paper explores some of the opportunities and priorities for urban electric mobility as part of an integrated sustainable urban mobility concept.

SOLUTIONS & UEMI Publications

UN-Habitat is grateful for the financial support provided by the government of Norway for the following paper.

Publication on Continuity and Change:
Dealing with Political Volatility to Advance Climate Change Mitigation Strategies—Examples from the Transport Sector
As the recent withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Agreement has shown, political volatility directly affects climate change mitigation policies, in particular in sectors, such as transport associated with long-term investments by individuals (vehicles) and by local and national governments (urban form and transport infrastructure and services). There is a large potential for cost-effective solutions to reduce green- house gas emissions and to improve the sustainability of the transport sector that is yet unexploited. Considering the cost-effectiveness and the potential for co-benefits, it is hard to understand why efficiency gains and CO2 emission reductions in the transport sector are still lagging behind this potential. Particularly interesting is the fact that there is substantial difference among countries with relatively similar economic performances in the development of their transport CO2 emissions over the past thirty years de- spite the fact that these countries had relatively similar access to efficient technologies and vehicles. This study aims to explore some well-established political science theories on the particular example of climate change mitigation in the transport sector in order to identify some of the factors that could help explain the variations in success of policies and strategies in this sector. The analysis suggests that institutional arrangements that contribute to consensus building in the political process provide a high level of political and policy stability which is vital to long-term changes in energy end-use sectors that rely on long-term investments. However, there is no direct correlation between institutional structures, e.g., corporatism and success in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector. Environmental objectives need to be built into the consensus-based policy structure before actual policy progress can be observed. This usually takes longer in consensus democracies than in politically more agile majoritarian policy environments, but the policy stability that builds on corporatist institutional structures is likely to experience changes over a longer-term, in this case to a shift towards low-carbon transport that endures.

Factors of Change: The influence of policy environment factors on climate change mitigation strategies in the transport sector
This study aims to apply some well established political science theories on the particular example of climate change mitigation in the transport sector in order to identify some of the factors that could help explain the variations in success of policies and strategies in this sector. The analysis suggests that institutional arrangements that contribute to consensus building in the political process provide a high level of political and policy stability which is vital to long-term changes in energy end-use sectors that rely on long-term investments. However, there is no direct correlation between institutional structures, e.g. corporatism and success in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector. Environmental objectives need to be built into the consensus-based policy structure before actual policy progress can be observed. This usually takes longer in consensus democracies than in politically more agile majoritarian policy environments, but the policy stability that builds on corporatist institutional structures is likely to experience changes over a longer-term, in this case to a shift towards low-carbon transport that endures.

The UEMI team is currently working on a set of assessments, guides and tools that will help developing and integrating e-mobility solutions into sustainable urban mobility strategies.

Working papers on electric mobility and sustainable transport

Publication: On a Pathway to Decarbonization
Considering the role of transport for a 1.5 Degree stabilization pathway and the importance of light-duty vehicle fuel efficiency within that, it is important to understand the key ele- ments of a policy package to shape the energy efficiency of the vehicle fleet. This paper pre- sents an analysis focusing on three types of policy measures: (1) CO2 emission standards for new vehicles, (2) vehicle taxation directly and indirectly based on CO2 emission levels, and (3) fuel taxation. The paper compares the policies in the G20 economies and estimates the financial impact of those policies using the example of a Ford Focus vehicle model. This analysis is a contribution to the assessment of the role of the transport sector in global decarbonisation efforts. The findings of this paper show that only an integrated approach of regulatory and fiscal policy measures can yield substantial efficiency gains in the vehicle fleet and can curb vehicle kilometres travelled by individual motorised transport. Using the illustrative example of one vehicle model, the case study analysis shows that isolated mea- sures, e.g. fuel efficiency regulation without corresponding fuel and vehicle taxes only have minor CO2 emission reduction effects and that policy measures need to be combined in order to achieve substantial emission reduction gains over time. The analysis shows that the highest level of impact is achieved by a combination regulatory and fiscal policies rather than only one policy even if this policy is more aggressive. When estimating the quantitative effect of fuel efficiency standards, vehicle and fuel tax, the analysis shows that substantial gains with regard to CO2 emission are only achieved at a financial impact level above 500 Euros over a four year period.

Publication:
Transport Pathways for Light Duty Vehicles: towards a 2° Scenario
The transport sector is the second largest and one of the fastest growing energy end-use sectors, representing 24% of global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions. The International Energy Agency has developed scenarios for the transport sector within the overall concept of mitigation pathways that would be required to limit global warming to 2 °C. This paper builds on these scenarios and illustrates various passenger travel-related strategies for achieving a 2° transport scenario, in particular looking at how much technology improvement is needed in the light of different changes in travel and modal shares in OECD and non-OECD countries. It finds that only an integrated approach using all feasible policy options is likely to deliver the required emission reductions at least cost, and that stronger travel-related measures result in significantly lower technological requirements.

Journal papers on electric mobility and sustainable transport

Lah, O. (2017). Decarbonising the transportation sector: policy options, synergies and institutions to deliver on a low-carbon stabilisation pathway, WIREs Energy and Environment, Volume 6 Issue 5.
Lah, O. (2017). Continuity and Change: Dealing with Political Volatility to Advance Climate Change Mitigation Strategies—Examples from the Transport Sector. Sustainability, 9(6).
Lah, O. (2017). Factors of Change: The influence of policy environment factors on climate change mitigation strategies in the transport sector. Transportation Research Procedia, 25, 3499–3514.
Lah, O. (2017). Sustainable development synergies and their ability to create coalitions for low-carbon transport measures. Transportation Research Procedia, 25, 5088–5098.
Yang, Z. Mock, P. Lah, O. (2017). On a pathway to de-carbonization–A comparison of new passenger car CO2 emission standards and taxation measures in the G20 countries, Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment,
Fulton, L, Mejia, A., Arioli, M., Dematera,K., Lah, O., (2017) Climate Change Mitigation Pathways for Southeast Asia: A Comparison of Energy-related NDC Targets and Strategies for Six ASEAN Countries, Sustainability, 9(6)
Sdoukopoulos, E., Kose, P. Gal-Tzur, A., Mezghani, M., Boile, M., Sheety, E., Mitropoulos, L. (2016) Assessment of Urban Mobility Needs, Gaps and Priorities in Mediterranean Partner Countries, Transportation Research Procedia, Volume 14, 2016, Pages 1211-1220, ISSN 2352-1465
Lah, O., (2015) The Barriers to Low-carbon Land-transport and Policies to overcome them, European Transport Research Review, 7:5 .
Figueroa, M. Lah, O., Fulton, L., McKinnon, A. Tiwari G. (2014) Energy for Transport, Annual Review of Environment and Resources, Vol. 39: 393-418.
Fulton, L. Lah, O., Cuenot, F. (2013) Transport Pathways towards a 2 Degree Scenario, Sustainability (Special Issue: Sustainable Cities).