Fuelling Road Transport - Implications for Energy Policy 

Fuelling Road Transport - Implications for Energy Policy

In this report that has been prepared for the UK transport ministry, the authors argue that diesel and petrol hybrid vehicles can do far more to cut net carbon emissions in the short term. It will take "at least 30 years" before mass-market use of hydrogen fuel cells produces a carbon benefit, the experts estimate.

The UK report contributes to a lively debate over how the transition from oil-based fuels should be managed by dismissing early large-scale introduction of hydrogen road fuels and even tax breaks for renewably produced hydrogen.

Mass-market use of hydrogen becomes environmentally preferable only when there is a surplus of renewable electricity from which to make it, the report concludes. Even allowing for some hydrogen to be produced from natural gas burned at high efficiency, it suggests, such a surplus - in the UK at least - is likely to take at least another 30 years to materialise.

Near-term strategies to cut road transport carbon emissions include greater use of natural gas, especially in heavy-duty fleet vehicles, and reforming natural gas to produce hydrogen.

Greater use of biomass fuels such as biodiesel and bioethanol would also provide net carbon benefits, though much less than woody biomass. The report concludes that, in the long-term, planting one-quarter of UK farmland with woody crops to make alcohol or hydrogen could satisfy almost all road transport fuel demand.

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