Motor transport - Obama wants to catch up with Europe
France has already reached the European CO2 emission target of 2012
Louis-Gilles Francoeur July 5, 2011
The City of Paris is rethinking urban transport in order to give a clear advantage to two-wheelers.
The car fleet in the United States is almost twice as polluting as its European and Japanese counterparts. President Obama would like to give a kick-start to launch all of North America into a major turn in this area. A bet bigger than an SUV ...
The White House confirmed, 48 hours ago, that intensive talks are currently taking place with the Association of Automobile Manufacturers with a view to setting an average consumption standard of 4,2 liters per 100 km for new vehicles that will be sold in the United States in 2025, which would reduce by several million tonnes of greenhouse gases (GHG) per year the balance sheet of this country and would decrease by several billion barrels the imports of oil.
The new standard, which would impose an average reduction in consumption of personal vehicles of 5% per year from 2017, would be announced in September. But already, manufacturers are calling for a more gradual implementation of this standard which, according to President Obama, would allow the United States to catch up with Europe, China and Japan. Finally, almost since his proposal constitutes a starting position in the negotiations.
The manufacturers would also like these standards to be lowered if they adopt certain advanced technologies, that Washington participates financially in the establishment of a public charging network for electric vehicles and that their financial situation be taken into account if the business was bad.
But what appears in North America as a huge technological challenge hides above all a big behavioral problem among motorists, because already, in Europe, the car fleet is already almost half as fuel efficient with cars with thermal engines (petrol or diesel) . And the standards that President Obama dreams of for 2025 will undoubtedly become reality in 2020 on the European continent. A country like France also dominates, along with Portugal, the list of the most energy-efficient fleets, with average CO2 emissions of only 130 grams per kilometer (g / km), i.e. the objective of 5,6 liters. for the 100 km targeted by European standards for 2012.
According to a study carried out in mid-June by Jato Dynamics consultants, in the first quarter of 2010, the US car fleet spat on average 255,6 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer (11 liters / 100 km), the worst record on the planet. In comparison, the European car fleet emitted 140,3 g / km at the same time and that of Japan, barely 130,8 g / km. A statistic illustrates better than anything that it is primarily a problem of behavior on the part of buyers and manufacturers' sales priorities: according to the study by Jato Dynamics, 34% of vehicles sold in the United States consume between 11,76 and 15,6 liters per 100 km, while this range, where sport utility vehicles (SUVs) are concentrated, represents only 0,28% of vehicles registered in Europe and 0,63% in Japan.
In Canada, the situation is hardly better than in the United States with average releases of 231 g / km. The Canadian average is essentially improved thanks to that of Quebec, which is 213 g / km, the best on the continent, of course, but nevertheless worse than anything found in Europe and Japan.
Planned success
The success achieved by France, and to a certain extent by Europe, results from a different approach. In an article that had a great impact in the United States a few days ago, the New York Times explained this difference as follows: whereas in North America, the slogan of urban planners is to improve fluidity traffic, in Europe, on the contrary, we multiply the obstacles to the use of the car for purchase, on the streets and in terms of parking to divert individual transport to public transport or modes less energy-consuming and less voracious in occupying the territory, such as bicycles and motorcycles, which take up even less space than an electric car.
According to recent reports by ADEME in France and, in January, by the Institute for Development and Transport Policies (ITDP), France's leading position in terms of the transformation of its fleet is based on three main strategies: a bonus-bonus which imposes a progressive surcharge on the purchase of energy-consuming vehicles to finance tax reductions granted to the least energy-consuming, a policy of radical parking reduction in several large cities where this strategy is preferred to " congestion taxes ”imposed by London and Stockholm to access their city center, and the priority now given to cycling in support of public transport policies capable of absorbing transfers from customers.
In Paris, there are currently 26 Vélib, the equivalent of the Montreal Bixi, distributed in 000 stations at an annual cost of $ 1451. After having multiplied the lanes reserved for bikes throughout Paris, we are now rethinking the urban fabric according to these means of transport, which gives an exceptional advantage to two-wheelers. In Paris, the parking available for cars on the streets has been reduced by 40% since 9, and 2003% of what remains available is now paid. The result: a 95% drop in car use.
In Zurich and Strasbourg, parking spaces are limited by standards in new real estate developments and even for each building according to the distance between them and public transport, which causes a radical increase in the purchase price of these spaces. . Between 2000 and 2005, this policy caused a 7% increase in ridership in public transport and reduced the use of the car by 6%.
In Barcelona, as in many other European cities where the number of parking lots has been reduced, the income generated is invested in Bicing, the free access bicycle system. In several areas of London, parking revenues finance reductions in public transport for the elderly or infirm, while congestion tax revenues imposed on the city center, imposed on cars, but not motorcycles and bikes, finance public transportation.
Source: http://www.ledevoir.com/environnement/a ... r-l-europe
