From Map to Policy: Road Transportation Emission Mapping and Optimizing BEV Incentives for True Emission Reductions

This study explores the importance of considering regional aspects and different calculation approaches when assessing the environmental impact of passenger cars in Germany. The transportation sector, in general, needs to improve its transition to comply with national and international goals, and more efficient measures are necessary. To achieve this, the spatial heterogeneity of underlying data, such as vehicle stocks, cubic capacity classes as a proxy for consumption values, and annual mileage, is investigated with respect to regional differences. Using data samples for the year 2017, the average emission values per car and year are calculated as well as Germany’s total emission values from the utilization of passenger cars. Conducting a spatially informed allocation algorithm, battery electric vehicles (BEVs) are added to certain regional fleets, replacing cars with internal combustion engines (ICEs). The results show significant regional differences in the underlying data, with a divergence between rural and urban areas as well as northern and southern regions, while the spread in mileage values is higher than that in consumption values. Comparing the tank-to-wheel (TtW) and well-to-wheel (WtW) approaches reveals different values with an increased spread as more BEVs are introduced to the fleet. Using the presented concept to allocate BEVs, emissions can be reduced by 1.66% to 1.35%, depending on the calculation perspective, compared to the extrapolation of historical values. Furthermore, rural areas benefit more from optimized allocation compared to urban ones. The findings suggest that regional distribution strategies could lead to more efficient reductions in GHG emissions within the transportation sector while incorporating both TtW and WtW approaches, leading to more comparable and precise analyses.