EPA - Ireland's Environment, An Integrated Assessment - 2020

Chapter 11: Environment and Transport Freight Transport Improving the sustainability of freight requires achieving a modal shift to rail, yet Irish rail freight has seen decades of decline and freight activity has shifted in the opposite direction: to road. The emissions outcomes of freight depend on factors such as the level and type of economic activity, whether the mode used is road or rail, and the demand-side efficiency factors of capacity usage, logistics, vehicle type and fuel. Ireland experienced a significant growth in freight activity up to a peak in 2007, and this growth was particularly strong in the freight-intensive construction sector. The economic recession saw a major drop in activity from that seen during the house- and road-building boom. There has been an increase in freight activity since the recession, measured by tonne-kilometres, linked to the economic recovery. However, it remains 39 per cent below its peak in 2007 (SEAI, 2019a), owing to the reduced trade in construction materials. A key plank of improving the sustainability of freight in the EU is achieving a modal shift to rail, yet Irish rail freight has seen decades of decline and a shift in the opposite direction: to road (O’Mahony et al. , 2012). Ireland now has the lowest proportion of rail freight in the EU-28, apart from Cyprus and Malta (McKinnon, 2019), pushing a shift towards the more energy- and emissions-intensive road modes. The energy efficiency of Irish road freight per tonne-kilometre is poor by international standards (SEAI, 2014), and does not appear to have improved since 2000. This suggests that factors such as logistics, matching vehicle to load and empty running are continuing to make freight more inefficient, as found in the previous analysis by O’Mahony et al. (2012). On the other hand, the carbon efficiency of road freight has changed only marginally, as biofuels now make up 4 per cent of energy consumed. Taken together, these factors have led to a continued increase in freight carbon dioxide emissions for the last 8 years. A discussion of decarbonisation of freight is included in Topic Box 11.2. The research study by Mulholland et al. (2020), for the EPA, discusses a variety of efficiency measures for transport decarbonisation and includes some logistical measures. Declining rail freight volumes in Ireland have sometimes been attributed to short distances and economics, through lack of cost competitiveness with road freight. However, distance need not be a limiting factor according to Booz & Company (2009), which offered examples of short freight distances in Ireland that continued to be economically viable. The viability of these routes is perceived as coming about through innovative logistics solutions and cost reductions. It is also notable that other relatively small countries, such as Portugal and New Zealand, have proven more successful. An expansion of the rail freight logistics network could be developed as part of a 2050+ rail vision, including rail heads, bypass lines, and consolidation and distribution services at stations. It is plausible that providing the required systems and infrastructure, and internalising the societal costs of roads (such as road traffic accidents, congestion, emissions, noise and habitat fragmentation) in transport pricing, could alter the economics to favour rail. Road modes almost exclusively generate the external societal costs of transport in the EU (Directorate-General for Mobility and Transport, 2019a). Owing to the relatively high costs of accidents and congestion of road freight, EU average external costs of heavy goods vehicles (€0.042 per tonne-kilometre), are more than three times as high as those of rail freight (€0.013 per tonne-kilometre). Passenger transport shows an even greater difference, with average external costs of the private car (€0.120 per passenger-kilometre) more than four times as high as rail (€0.028 per passenger-kilometre), and electrified rail cheaper still. Light goods vehicles are a significant source of emissions (Figure 11.2), almost half as much as heavy goods vehicles. They have been separated in the data only since 2014, and increases may be attributed to factors such as increased carriage of goods and just-in-time deliveries. The EEA has suggested that there is scope for a reduction in light vehicle trips through providing a service that facilitates consolidation of small shipments (EEA, 2020b). This could be combined with new facilities at rail stations to enhance the feasibility of switching freight to rail in the long term. Topic Box 11.2 Five decarbonisation initiatives for freight transition The global freight expert, and IPCC lead author on transport, Professor Alan McKinnon, discussed freight transition at the Climate Change Advisory Council’s 2019 workshop on ‘Transition of Irish Transport: Issues, Approaches and Options’ (McKinnon, 2019). McKinnon (2018) applies the avoid-shift-improve (ASI) framework to future freight transition, through a hierarchy of five decarbonisation initiatives: demand management; shifting to lower intensity modes; logistics and vehicle loading; improving energy efficiency; and reducing carbon intensity by using electric vehicles, compressed natural gas vehicles, etc. He outlines a plethora of advanced future- proofed levers and options at each level and considers implications. McKinnon concludes that meeting an 80 per cent greenhouse gas reduction target by 2050 may not be possible without demand management, and notes that freight shift to rail is ideal. He also discusses the unique needs of freight, as distinct from passenger transport, which often are not sufficiently separated. 287