Happy Thursday friends! Here’s my weekly take on the five most interesting developments in LCFV trends over the last week, and boy was it busy:
Following British Columbia, the Government of Canada announced this week that it would develop and implement a “national clean fuels standard”, essentially a low carbon fuels standard (LCFS) for the country. The country currently has in place a Renewable Fuels Regulation, which requires 5% ethanol in gasoline (but in actuality is at 7% right now) and 2% renewable content in diesel fuel.
The government’s goal is to achieve annual reductions of 30 megatons (Mt) of GHG emissions by 2030, providing a significant contribution towards achieving Canada’s commitment of 30% emissions reduction below 2005 levels, by 2030. This reduction is like removing over 7 million vehicles from the roads for a year. The government will follow California’s lead and develop a performance-based standard that sets carbon intensity standards that are expected to foster low carbon fuels such as electricity, biogas, hydrogen, and renewable fuels.
Environment and Climate Change Canada will publish a discussion paper in February 2017 to help guide consultations consisting of meetings, workshops, and technical-working groups that will help inform the development of Canada’s clean fuel standard.
Keep watching this space: I don’t believe this is the last country to follow the LCFS path.
The race is on to finalize the 2022-2025 fuel economy standards, which was expected to happen next year, but has clearly been sped up before President-Elect Trump takes office in January. Read more about it here.
The GAO released a report this week finding it is “unlikely that the goals of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS)—reduce greenhouse gas emissions and expand the nation’s renewable fuels sector—will be met as envisioned because there is limited production of advanced biofuels to be blended into domestic transportation fuels and limited potential for expanded production by 2022.” Read more about it here.
This week the European Commission released its draft revised regulation of the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) affecting biofuels and advanced biofuels/alternative fuels. Read more about it here.
This article details how EVs are becoming more and more mainstream in China, although not without challenges and difficulties, such as: