Achieving zero emission transportation in a regional perspective: Addressing municipal climate goals in Umeå

Abstract

Climate goals have been adopted on multiple different levels in society to limit global warming according to the Paris Agreement. The municipality of Umeå has set a goal of reaching net zero emissions by 2040, where 41 % of the current emissions come from the transportation sector. Even though the municipality has set the goal of mitigating emissions, only a fraction of the emissions is directly emitted by the municipality organization. Abatement measures must be implemented to reach the climate goal, but the understanding of their impact on the system is lacking. In the thesis, abatement measures for the transportation sector in Umeå are identified and characterised based on their cost, abatement potential, and how they abate the emissions. The dynamics between the measures are visualised in Marginal Abatement Cost curves. The visualisation highlights that the conditions of abatement measures are impacted depending on which other measures have been implemented and in what manner they reduce the emissions. This highlights the importance of the order of implementation as well as the allocation of abatement potential to reduce the risk of double counting, especially when a combination of abatement measures is implemented. Furthermore, it is difficult to quantify the cost and abatement potential of measures that depend on a change of behaviour due to the uncertainty of the impact, but the abatement potentials of these measures are generally smaller in comparison to cost-driven measures. Other dimensions can however make behaviour change measures important to invest in. The municipality has to motivate other actors to reduce their emissions while simultaneously reducing the emissions of the municipality’s own organisation, in order to reach its climate goal.