Q: Please can you briefly explain your current role and expertise on this topic?
John Cooper, FuelsEurope and Concawe (JC): I am Director General at FuelsEurope and Concawe, the Advocacy Organisation part and the Science Organisation part of the Association for European Fuels Manufacturers, based in Brussels, where we represent the industry to the Institutions of the European Union.
Steve Whelan, HORIBA MIRA (SW): I have been developing ICE powertrains for over 30 years and working with alternative fuels for much of this time. I am now developing new optimisation methodologies for real driving emissions and efficiency. Combining sustainable fuels with new ICE and hybrid-electric technology will deliver net-zero, whilst achieving air quality targets.
Tom Lamy, Gasrec (TL): I work as a Projects Development Lead at Gasrec which sees me double hatting by developing natural gas refuelling stations (Liquid Natural Gas or Compressed Natural Gas) in the UK as well as the procurement of biomethane fuel, which is supplied through those stations. Biomethane is a “drop in substitute” for fossil natural gas, meaning any vehicles that run on natural gas can be directly supplied with biomethane with no conversions required. We are seeing emissions reductions for our customers in the order of 70-90% as well as it being a renewable fuel. I took on the biomethane piece as a project 3 years ago at a time when Gasrec wasn’t supplying any biomethane to the market, and it’s just grown from there to the point where we supply the majority of our fuel as biomethane.
Thanasis Megaritis, Concawe (TM): My current role as an Air Quality Science Associate in Concawe involves several activities that expand from better characterising the emissions within a refinery to better assess their impact as well as the impact of the emissions coming from the end-use products to air quality. There is an increasing need for robust, evidence-based research for assessing how air quality can be further improved through the implementation of cost-effective emissions reductions measures, and air quality models could play an important role towards this. Having a background in air quality modelling, I am heavily involved in understanding how air quality models can be used in supporting air quality assessments and for the development of effective air quality management plans. Road transport is a key contributor to air pollution, especially in urban areas, and the Air Quality team in Concawe has an extensive research program to better address the role of the transport sector in improving air quality.
Q: What do you think is the number one challenge for the transport industry looking to reduce vehicle emissions?
JC: We need to scale up a range of technologies altogether to cover the wide range of transport modes. Whilst electrification and hydrogen will play a major part, there will still be a role for some liquid fuels. We have probably overestimated the potential for electrification, and underestimated the potential role for renewable, low, or net-zero-carbon liquid and gaseous fuels.
SW: Infrastructure - access to sustainable fuels and electrical charging.
TL: I can’t speak for all modes of transport as natural gas fuel (LNG or CNG) is suited to heavy duty transport in particular. We are in the part of the adoption curve where we are seeing heavy demand for stations but it’s still on us to build out and fill in the network infrastructure. It’s going to require a collaborative approach between us, the fuel supplier, and the transport operators to ensure we are able to develop sites that stack up for everyone.
TM: Transport represents almost a quarter of Europe's greenhouse gas emissions and is considered one of the main sources of air pollution in cities. According to the European Environment Agency, the transport sector has not followed the general downwind trend of GHG emissions, with road transport accounting for around 70% of all GHG emissions from transport in 2017. At the same time, more than 60% of total NOx emissions in Europe were attributed to transport emissions.
A shift to low-emission mobility is important to address the emission reduction challenge in the transport sector. Several initiatives have been already taken to reduce emissions from transport (e.g., scrappage schemes for replacing old vehicles with new ones, latest Euro standards, latest treatment techniques) which has eventually improved air quality and been proven to be efficient and effective solutions to reduce vehicle emissions. On the way forward, a strategy that will integrate a broader set of efficient, risk-based, and cost-effective measures will be key in supporting a transition towards to this direction.
Q: What would you say is the technology to watch when it comes to alternative fuels?
JC: Advanced biofuels from a wide range of waste, residues and co-products have significant potential to complement what can be achieved with electrification, energy efficiency, and hydrogen technologies.
SW: Biomethane with gas-to-liquid technology as a first deployment. Obviously, green hydrogen is a probable end-goal, but we need achievable victories along the way. Hydrogen storage is a key enabling technology. But hydrogen is not a fuel, it is effectively a battery that can be used to balance the national power grid and (probably) store more energy on a vehicle.
TL: I’m biased but I would say that biomethane in heavy duty transport is available now, it works, and it can achieve transport emissions reductions in excess of 100% today! I watch the developments in hydrogen with interest however it’s not commercially viable today, maybe in the next ten years?
TM: There is no ‘silver bullet’ that will deliver low-emission mobility across all transport segments. On the contrary, many different technologies will be needed to achieve current as well as future climate and air quality targets. In particular, technologies could be developed on the basis of two main pillars:
- Electrification, based on low carbon electricity grids;
- Low carbon fuels, based on renewable feedstocks, where two main technologies are foreseen: Biofuels, made from renewable biomass or waste; and e-fuels, made from green H2 and recycled or captured CO2.
Q: What is your advice to organisations just starting their work towards sustainable fuels?
JC: We should all understand that sustainable liquid and gaseous fuels will likely be more expensive than the petroleum based counterparts for some years to come, mostly because the high capital intensity of the first small plants, the technology risks, and the need to cover all of these costs in the first 10-15 years of operations. Organisations need to be able to take a longer term view, and also to understand how the various policy support mechanisms can work in the countries of the world with strong climate action objectives. Ideally, these organisations should join the policy debate about how this industry can scale up, and what policies or regulations will assist this.
SW: Be pragmatic and consider life-cycle carbon and well-to-wheels. Maybe the end-game is green electricity for all and low cost, high energy density batteries? But for now, what can be done to make an impact and make progress to net-zero by 2050?
TL: Don’t order your new vehicle fleet until you fully understand how the fuel supply will work – this could lead to costly mistakes! We would be happy to talk to any businesses running HGVs to explain their options and the possible benefits.
TM: The manufacture of low-carbon and sustainable fuels has huge potential to contribute to Europe’s goals for cleaner air and a low-GHG economy. Any initiative that will offer a means of evidence- and risk-based, pragmatic as well as transitional approach, and will reflect today’s but also future’s technological development, available renewable and highly efficient low-carbon solutions should be considered as a contributor towards to this transition. In this transition, low carbon fuels should be considered as drivers that contribute to decarbonise both new and future vehicles, and the legacy fleet.
Q: What has been your progress and/or biggest achievements when it comes to reducing emissions in transport whether that be through fuel research or implementation?
JC: Concawe has put together a comprehensive pathway showing the scale up of several key technologies which could enable us to reach a total production of around 150 million tonnes per year of liquid fuels production, where every litre would be climate neutral, or very close to that. It is based on feedstock availability data from the European Commission's Joint Research Centre, and we have worked out the total investment costs as well. It takes into account the necessary learning curves for the commercialisation and cost reduction of the various technologies too. Meanwhile FuelsEurope have put together a strategy for the supporting policies to enable the necessary investments, and also to enable the affordability for customers such that significant volumes could be supplied to the remaining needs in road transport, and then to aviation and maritime sectors at scale.
SW: I lead the delivery of natural gas and biomethane technology to the heavy-duty truck sector. The technology was launched into serial production with Volvo and has enabled heavy duty trucks to use sustainable biomethane (and lower carbon natural gas) instead of diesel. Currently, there is no better solution to eliminate carbon emissions from heavy trucks.
TL: Working with the Department for Transport to unlock biomethane supply to trucks via a mass balance via the gas grid. This ensured we could supply biomethane in a cost-effective manner, by substituting it for fossil natural gas we supplied to our customers. We managed to scale up and nowadays we supply 100% waste-derived biomethane to our customers, which is providing emissions reductions in the range of 70-90% versus diesel.
TM: As mentioned, air quality is a major driver of moving to low-emissions mobility, as many European cities are exploring ways to comply with ambient air quality standards. This makes transport, and its road segment in particular, a major target for implementing emissions reductions measures to improve compliance. Under this, recent modelling work by Concawe has shown that a progressive replacement of diesel vehicles by new vehicles that are fitted with the latest after-treatment technology (Euro 6d or equivalent) as well as fully compliant under real driving conditions, could deliver significant improvements to air quality in cities that are comparable to those with replacing all new diesel vehicles by zero emission vehicles. This indicates that in the long-term future and as we are moving towards 2030, road transport will diminish as a contributor in poor air quality in cities and that understanding emissions sources at the local level will be key to finding the targeted measures that will be most effective and best value for addressing the remaining hot spots in cities in the short-term. Concawe is working in developing robust tools to address the remaining questions in terms of air quality and compliance achievement.
Q: What breakthroughs in terms of technology do we need for fuels that are in enough supply as well as being cost-effective?
JC: We need to see further development of feedstock aggregation and pre-treatment value chains, Fischer-Tropsch and also enzymatic technologies for biomass conversion, an improvement in hydrolysis costs, and then e-fuels technologies.
SW: The benefit of using sustainable fuels is that no new technology is required to use them. If they are in enough supply, then existing ICEs are ready today (for biomethane) or could be readily adapted (for hydrogen). The storage of these fuels on-board vehicles, especially for hydrogen, would benefit from new technology. However, adequate range can be achieved for an HGV from existing liquified gas technology.
TL: Currently biomethane is typically produced by anaerobic digestion of agricultural waste, food waste or sewage. We need more ways of turning more and different types of waste streams into biofuels such as biomethane to ensure there is plenty of supply into the future as the demand grows.
TM: A well-established R&D framework with a wide range of innovative and potential breakthrough technologies will be important in retaining the competitiveness of the fuels and transport industry towards the transition to low-emissions mobility. For example, experience should be shared across the EU in several topic areas through collaborative innovation, training and research activities to meet the expected growth in demand for low-carbon fuels. In addition, market uptake of such fuels should be promoted by supporting well-targeted collaborative projects. Long-term initiatives to strengthen international cooperation on certifying, labelling and using low-carbon fuels in other transport segments is another example.
Q: Why do you feel it is important for all engineers and professionals involved in vehicle emissions reduction to be part of the conversation about the future of fuels?
JC: Policy decisions to reduce GHG emissions and to aim for net–zero by mid-century need to be supported by strong regulations and policy interventions. These need to be informed by the deep expertise of engineers and other technologists. They may not always say it clearly, but I do believe that governments need our help to design the right markets for energy and mobility for the future, such that a range of solutions emerge.
SW: Engineers need to understand the whole story and remain technology-neutral, focused only on solutions that can achieve the end goal. There are many ways to achieve net-zero. Electrification is only one of them. Today, it is not the answer to all sectors. Engineers need to keep an open mind and be pragmatic about using the best tool for the job. Clearly, sustainable fuel is the most effective solution to eliminate carbon in the heavier-duty sectors in the short-to-medium timeframe.
TL: In order to reduce emissions from transport the best solution is going to come from the vehicle technology itself, but also the fuel and the infrastructure; all three elements have to work together. Understanding this is critical for us to see the opportunities for new developments and for innovation.
TM: Undoubtedly, any commitment to vehicle emission reductions will require a combination of transport policy options that should be implemented over different periods, some being implemented during a transition period, and others in the long-term at EU, national, regional, and local authority levels. In order for these options to be effective in terms of feasibility, cost, level of achievement, they should be based on sound science, well established research and development frameworks and robust data. The role of engineers and professionals involved in vehicle emissions reduction will be therefore pivotal.
In addition, future low carbon fuels may involve new compounds and molecules, which may differ from the ones traditionally found in fossil fuels. These alternative compounds, which may have an important impact in terms of decarbonising the transport sector, may also have different characteristics in terms of combustion, emissions, material compatibility, etc. For all these reasons, it is important to keep the whole chain of automotive engineers involved in the discussion about the future of fuels and keep the interaction alive.
The Engineering Fuels for the Future: Climate Neutral Fuels for 1.5°C seminar will be taking place live online on 7 July 2021.
Join this seminar to:
- Hear from pioneering organisations in the field of climate-neutral fuels including FuelsEurope, Rolls-Royce, Porsche, BEIS, Climate Change Committee and Shell
- Learn about developments in carbon-based and carbon-free alternative fuels including biomethane, synthetic fuels, hydrogen and ammonia to take back to your organisation
- Discover how alternative fuel use is shaping propulsion design across a variety of applications including aerospace, marine, heavy-duty, off-highway as well as passenger vehicles
- Gain insight into the lessons learned from the pandemic regarding air pollution and how these are being taken forward to influence transport propulsion design and application
- Grasp the overall scale-up challenge for sustainable fuels and how this is being managed.
To view the full programme and book your place, please visit the event website.