Transport & Environment

IFEU and "Transport & Environment"

"Transport & Environment" is an important field of work within IFEU already since 1982. Key activities are the analysis of energy consumption and emissions of all motorised transportation systems as well as the development and evaluation of measures and strategies to reduce traffic induced environmental impacts.

Evaluations and expertises on these topics have been commissioned or supported by federal, state and local authorities, industry, associations and political parties as well as the European Union and the World Bank. An important additional part of our activity is the consultancy for industry and non-profit organisations as wells as the participation of IFEU-scientists in several boards on a national and international level.

Key activities

The broad array of studies and reports covers the following subject areas:

• Inventories, Basic Data and Scenarios of the complete Transport Sector (Germany [TREMOD], German federal states, other countries, local authorities)

• Comparison of Transport Systems - analysis and evaluation (long and short distance passenger transport, freight transport, national and international)

• Vehicle Concepts - different drive trains and energy carriers (gasoline, diesel, gas, electric, fuel cell vehicles as well as the use of biofuels)

• Air Quality - causes and measures (emissions of carcinogenic substances, particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, nitrogen dioxides ) as well as resulting impacts on air quality, compliance with targets and indicators

• Climate and Ressources - concepts and strategies (from technical changes via speed limits to changes in modal split, climate change concepts, flexible mechanisms)

News from the department

EcoTransIT World for worldwide transports

31.05.2010 The Ecological Transport Information Tool (EcoTransIT) calculates environmental impacts of any freight transport. Thereby it is possible to determine the energy consumption, CO2 and exhaust emissions transported by rail, road, ship and aircraft in any combination. - The new version which exists since end of May was commissioned by UIC (worldwide organisation of cooperation for railway companies), DB Schenker Rail Deutschland AG and some other European Railway Companies. The scientific support was again given by IFEU und for the first time by Öko-Institut concerning aviation and maritime shipping.

More information ...

Comparative Environmental Assessment of Coaches

12.04.2010 Coach buses are not generally known to be environmentally friendly, though they have the advantage of being a sector of public transport with high occupancy rates and often efficient vehicles. However, most coach buses have diesel engines which emit nitrogen oxides and particles. Already in 2004 IFEU has compared coaches with passenger cars, trains and aircraft for the International Coach Tourism Federation (RDA): The analysis showed a good environmental performance of coaches. Now an updated version of this"'comparative environmental assessment of coaches" ("Vergleichende Umweltbilanz des Reisebusses") is available which takes into account the improved fuel consumption and emission behaviour of the different transport modes.

Download (via RDA-Website)

UMBReLA – Environmental Assessment of Electric Mobility

02.02.2010 In the UMBReLA project IFEU consolidates results with relevance for an environmental assessment from a number of electric mobility research projects and fleets tests. In addition to this comprehensive environmental assessment of different types of battery electric mobility, an internet platform is developed which gives an overview on electric mobility research activities and will offer an online calculation tool for environmental impacts.

More information on the project ....

More information on electric mobility ...

Transport and Air Pollution

24.06.09 09 “Agricultural tractors and construction machinery contribute significantly to particle and NO_x emissions in Germany” said Hinrich Helms at the 2009 ‘Transport and Air Pollution Symposium’ in Toulouse. But EU emission legislation is already beginning to show some effect. Based on the calculation model TREMOD-MM, which has been developed for the German Federal Environment Agency, he also illustrated that emissions are expected to further decline in the future.
As in previous years, IFEU scientists presented recent research results at the international „Transport and Air Pollution Symposium” (together with the „Environment and Transport Symposium“). His colleague Frank Dünnebeil (right) presented results on the effectiveness of traffic measures for a reduction of NO₂ concentrations in the Tyrolean Inn Valley. He also gave an overview on energy consumption and CO₂ emissions of traffic in Shanghai.

Presentation on mobile machinery (pdf, 762 KB)

More information on NO₂

More information on transport in China

Eco-Inventory of Transport Options with Internet Tools

02.07.2008 The international association for railways (UIC) and the European Environment Agency (EEA) launch the EcoPassenger and EcoTransIT (new version) internet tools to calculate and compare the energy consumption and emissions of different transport modes in Europe. The scientific methodology for the calculations was developed in cooperation with IFEU.
More information on EcoPassenger
More information on EcoTransIT

NO₂-Immission:
New challenge. Presentation at VDA-Meeting

03.04.2008 Two air quality limit values for nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) come into force in 2010: A limit value of 40 µg/m3 for the annual mean concentration and a one hour value of 200 µg/m3 which must not be exceeded more than 18 times every year. These values have already been set in 1999 as minimum requirements for human health protection. In his presentation "Hohe NO₂-Belastungen: Für Dieselabgase weiterhin Handlungsbedarf", Udo Lambrecht shows that considerable further efforts are necessary in order to achieve a timely compliance with these standards. Especially the emissions of motor vehicles need to be reduced. More information...