In November 2022, as global policymakers prepared to gather at the COP27 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Egypt, the International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers (OICA) released a position paper titled “Carbon Neutrality by 2050,” a comprehensive framework of specific policy recommendations to support the decarbonization of road transport.
For automakers around the world, decarbonizing road transport is a shared goal to which they are committed. However, as the OICA framework emphasizes, there is a need for flexibility through multiple, technology-open approaches in order to provide practical and sustainable pathways to carbon neutrality by 2050 for all nations. To achieve carbon neutrality, measures to reduce CO2 emissions from new vehicles, and also from in-use vehicles, must be pursued. To that end, it is important that technologies be advanced across a spectrum: for zero-emission vehicles (i.e., battery and fuel cell electric vehicles) which emit no direct CO2, and for internal combustion engine-equipped vehicles powered by CO2-offsetting energy such as carbon-neutral fuels.
Regardless of the technologies adopted, achieving decarbonization within the 2050 timeframe depends on government and industry partnerships and continued investment commitments from the entire road transport ecosystem for reliable infrastructure and resilient supply chains.
As representatives of the global automobile industry, taking into consideration the current global geopolitical and socioeconomic situation, we believe that this reaffirmation to achieve carbon neutrality in our sector by 2050 is timely.
OICA’s “Carbon Neutrality by 2050” can be accessed here.
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