Reduction emissions from heavy vehicles in connection with the improvement of their technology is “lost” due to an increase road transport. His report comes to this conclusion European Environment Agencywhich notes how limited the use of heavy-duty electric and hybrid vehicles remains in European countries, a sector that accounts for a quarter of road transport’s carbon emissions.

According to the report:

• While greenhouse gas emissions have been steadily declining over the past decade, carbon dioxide emissions from heavy-duty vehicles have been steadily rising since 2014. The only exception is 2020 due to the pandemic. In general, from 1990 to 2019, the increase in emissions of cars in this class was 29%. 85% of emissions come from heavy vehicles and the remaining 15% from buses and trailers.

In Greece, all new heavy trucks run on petrol or diesel, with petrol predominating in cars and vans.

• While the efficiency of heavy vehicles has increased, this is not enough to reduce their emissions. The reason is none other than the increased demand for road transport. For example, while product shipments by river and rail increased by 5% between 2000 and 2019, road transport grew by 31%. As a result, the proportion of goods transported by heavy goods vehicles increased from 72% in 2000 to 76.4% in 2019. This increase absorbed the efficiency gains of heavy goods vehicles: energy consumption per ton per kilometer fell by 15% in 2000. -2019.

The report focuses on new heavy vehicles registered in European countries. Approximately using one year, from summer 2019 to summer 2020, in the EU. 386,700 new heavy vehicles, 260,500 trailers and 44,050 buses have been registered. Of these, 98% run on gasoline or diesel fuel, 2% run on LPG, and very few (less than 0.1%) are hybrid and electric heavy vehicles. In Greece, 673 trucks, 95 trailers and 458 buses running on gasoline or diesel fuel were registered during the period. As for cars and minibuses, 70% of cars in our country run on gasoline, 27% on diesel fuel and 2% on liquefied petroleum gas.

The report points to the need for the EU. develop a different transport model: more efficient methods such as rail and sea transport are supported to transport products. And for the movement of citizens, strengthening public transport. It should be noted that, according to EU legislation, heavy goods vehicles must reduce their emissions by 15% by 2025 and by 30% by 2030 compared to 2019. By the end of the year, the measure will be extended to buses and trailers, as well as smaller trucks with mandatory targets by 2040.

However, the report concludes that in order to facilitate the “switch” of vehicles to cleaner fuels, it is also necessary to strengthen charging or hydrogen charging stations and create incentives for fleet renewal.