Car reliance a challenge as transport's carbon budgets loom

The number of electric vehicles (EV) on Irish roads last year almost doubled from 2020, but private cars are still the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector.

The number of electric vehicles (EV) on Irish roads last year almost doubled from 2020, but private cars are still the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector.

In a publication of transport trends for 2021, the Department of Transport said that transport is the second-largest contributor of emissions and will therefore be key in meeting the 51% national emission reduction target set out in the Programme for Government.

The transport sector emitted 10.3 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2020.  CO2 equivalent is the standard unit for measuring all greenhouse gases when put together. 

They include carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and fluorinated gases and are measured in a common unit for simplicity and clarity purposes.

The department said that if targets set out in carbon budgets are met, the emissions from transport could fall to six million tonnes by the end of the decade.

In terms of Ireland’s reliance on transport in and out of the country, the report said that Irish exports and imports combined to an amount over twice the size of Ireland’s GDP in 2020.

“Only Luxembourg (376.3%), Hong Kong (351.7%), and Malta (271.5%) recorded higher levels of trade openness, while the average across all OECD members was 51.8%,” it said.

Clearly, Ireland’s economy is heavily dependent on the movement of goods and services into and out of the country, and thus also dependent on efficient domestic and international transport networks.

Ireland is still “heavily reliant” on the private car to transport people, and the large drop in emissions from transport in recent years coincided with the Covid-19 pandemic, when movement was severely restricted.

It resulted in a decrease in kilometres driven, vehicles on the roads and passenger journeys, the report said. While public transport journeys by the four main State operators fell by 54% in 2020, it noted a steady month-on-month uptick in journeys since the beginning of 2021. 

The expenditure allocation for the Department of Transport in 2021 was €3.48bn. While this was an increase of 34.5% from 2020, the allocation for 2022 was actually 3.9% less than 2021.

While taxation revenue from the likes of excise duties fell during the pandemic, tax on diesel and petrol was the largest source of transport-related tax revenue for the State in 2020 at €1.77bn. Revenue from carbon tax in the same year was up 7% to €259m.

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The figures also show a large drop in the number of taxis on the roads. In 2020, there were 1,500 less taxis on our roads, dropping 10.4% to 13,253.

It noted that Ireland’s aviation sector is one of the most heavily dependent on UK traffic across Europe. Over one in every three Irish flights in 2020 was to or from the UK.

“The UK remained an important component of passenger traffic at Cork Airport,” it said, with routes to and from London Heathrow and London Stansted representing a third of all traffic through Cork. The next highest was Amsterdam Schiphol, accounting for 8.8% of all trips to and from Cork Airport.

While Dublin Airport had a more even spread of routes, Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and Manchester were all in the top five routes in terms of volume of passengers.