By: Staff Writer
November 28, 2023
The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in a new report said that reducing the amount of carbon emissions in the amount of transportation the region uses can significantly lower the amount of Greenhouse Gases (GHG).
The report, “Pathways to decarbonization and climate resilience in Latin America and the Caribbean,” said: “Transportation is key to reduce GHG emissions and fight against climate change. With 25 percent of global emissions from fuel combustion, transportation is the second largest contributor of CO2, behind electricity and heating generation.
It added: “LAC has a small share of the total CO2 emissions of the transportation sector worldwide (9 percent). However, this share has increased by 112 percent between 1990 and 2019. The region’s share in the global total went from 7 percent to 9 percent between 1990 and 2019, while North America and Europe –starting from higher levels of emissions– showed significant decreases (-11 percent and -7 percent, respectively). Likewise, the transportation sector is the largest source of GHG emissions in the region, accounting for 40 percent of total emissions.”
Despite the LAC having the smallest share of CO2 emissions for the transport sector worldwide, per capita, is still has a significantly high amount of fossil fuel vehicles. Battery electric vehicles are currently outnumbered 10,000:1 by combustion engines.
The report also said: “Within LAC’s transportation sector, road transportation is the main contributor to CO2 emissions, accounting for 94 percent of the total. This is similar to global values, which range from 82 percent in China to 98 percent in the Middle East. Domestic aviation contributes with 4 percent, domestic shipping with 2 percent, and rail with 1 percent. When differentiating between passenger and freight transportation, it can be seen that most of the CO2 produced by transportation in LAC comes from passenger transportation, mainly from road transportation.”
It continued, “Unlike what is happening in Europe and the United States, in the region there is no decoupling between economic growth and emissions from the transportation sector, evidencing an intensive growth in emissions for LAC. However, it is important to consider that the decoupling analysis does not take into account the significant role of international trade, whose emissions are not assigned to any country, neither to producer nor to consumer countries. Yet, smaller economies are the most emission-intensive ones in the region.”
Solutions are needed and the region must act now to change the trajectory of transportation contribution to CO2 and GHG emissions.
“LAC needs to deploy a battery of funding and financing mechanisms to guarantee the necessary resources for the sector to develop efficient, inclusive, and sustainable transportation systems. Closing the gaps in the sector implies improving the efficiency of funds and instruments used, and exploring innovative funding and financing mechanisms. In this regard, financial instruments associated with CC and sustainability represent an opportunity for the region, in addition to the need to significantly increase the volume and improve the efficiency of traditional financing and funding mechanisms available in the sector,” the report advocated.