By Themeholy 21 June, 2024 Comments (3)

Policy: Vehicle Efficiency Control

What does it do?

Vehicular efficiency control is a policy that mandates transport machinery follow certain minimum standards in order to reduce their carbon emissions. In Pakistan, the transport sector accounts for 28% of all greenhouse gas emissions, and the number of motorbikes has risen 928% in the past 20 years. Hence, regulating transport machinery becomes crucial to mitigating climate change.

Implementation involves setting emission standards for new vehicles, investing in research for machines providing more mileage per gallon of fuel, reducing emissions from existing vehicles through retrofitting programs, and incentivizing the use of low-emission vehicles like electric cars/bikes. Effective enforcement, public awareness, and investment in research and development for cleaner technologies are critical for success.

Have other countries used it?

Different countries and regions recommend varying minimum standards of efficiency for personal vehicles.. The most commonly used metric to measure vehicle efficiency is fuel economy, which is usually expressed in miles per gallon (mpg) or liters per 100 kilometers (L/100 km).

• USA:
CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) agency sets standards for the American automotive industry regarding the fuel consumption patterns of cars. Regulations state that the cars should average 27.5 mpg (11km/l) and light trucks 23.5 mpg (9.5km/l). In 2022, this was optimized to an industry-wide fleet average of 49 mpg for passenger cars and light trucks in model year 2026. The US implements this by mandating that only cars with ‘efficiency’ stickers be allowed in certain protected zones.
• European Union:
The EU set a target in 2021 of 100% reduction in emissions for 2035. This means that all new cars or vans placed on the market in the EU from 2035 should be zero-emission vehicles. Projected CO2 emission reductions for new cars and vans: 2021 - limit of 95 grams of CO2e/km for cars and 147 grams of CO2e/km for vans 2030 – 55% reduction for cars and 50% for vans (compared to the 2021 targets) 2035 - 100% reduction for cars and vans
• India:
The Bureau of Energy Efficiency in India has set new standards for fuel efficiency for passenger vehicles (hatchbacks, sedans, SUV’s, MPV’s etc.) must have an average fuel efficiency of 18.2 km/l

Has Pakistan used it?

In Pakistan, the fleet emissions intensity of passenger cars was recorded at approximately 185 gCO2e/km in 2013, indicating their low efficiency. In addition, our country has the highest usage of compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles globally, which contributed to 49 percent of the energy consumption by passenger cars in 2013. Though CNG cars have lower GHG emissions than gasoline cars, emitting 166 gCO2e/km compared to 203 gCO2e/km, the overall vehicle efficiency of Pakistan's car fleet remains subpar in contrast to what it should be in order to mitigate climate change.

Pakistan started late. Up until 2022, we had no emissions control policy on a national level, owing to the belief that caring about climate change is not affordable to developing countries like ours which need to industrialize and grow. However, we were proven wrong by the catastrophic flooding in 2022 and the smog crisis in Lahore. In 2023, Pakistan’s Climate Change Division unveiled the National Clean Air Policy. Its salient features related to personal vehicles include implementing a fuel quality standard of Euro 5 or Euro 6, and suggesting the development of zoning based on AQI to redirect traffic. However, we do not believe these ‘plans’ are operationalized enough to lead to significant change, since no publicly transparent monitoring/evaluation mechanism was introduced besides an internal check by the Ministry.