The Research On Emission Reduction Effects Of The Vehicle Electrification In EU

Climate change is a topic of great concern in the environmental field,and reducing carbon emissions has become a consensus in the international community.The Paris Agreement proposes to limit the global average temperature rise to 1.5°C.Parties need to make National Determined Contribution and explore sustainable development approaches.The use of electric vehicles(EVs)is one of the concrete solutions for a low carbon economy.The EU,which was the first to achieve overall carbon peaking as early as 1990,is still facing continued growth in carbon emissions from the transport sector,and the electrification of passenger cars has been one of its key environmental policies in recent years;sloppy growth has been a chronic problem for China’s economy,and in order to change growth forces and accelerate the achievement of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality targets,it is necessary to learn from the EU’s experience in developing EVs.The impact of EVs on carbon emission,the economy and society is complex and profound.This paper will follow the ideas of current situation analysis,policy review,impact mechanism and empirical test to study the emission reduction effect of EVs in the EU.In the theoretical analysis part: firstly,the theories related to the factors affecting carbon emissions are introduced as the basis for model construction and result analysis.Secondly,European EV market is comprehensively deconstructed from the perspectives of production,sales,ownership and charging point density,and the EV support policies of the EU and its member states are sorted out from top to bottom,including the rigid constraints of laws and regulations and the flexible incentives of preferential subsidies.Finally,the mechanisms by which EVs affect carbon emissions are analyzed according to Life Cycle Assessment(LCA),and the economic and social costs of the passenger car electrification are discussed.In the empirical analysis section: an extended STIRPAT model is constructed by incorporating EV penetration into the IPAT carbon impact factor analysis framework,with carbon emissions and carbon intensity as the dependent variables,respectively,and a two-way fixed effects model analysis is conducted on panel data for 32 European countries from 2012-2019,and the moderating effect of carbon intensity in the electricity sector on EV emission reduction is tested through an interaction term.The endogeneity of the model is addressed using 2SLS estimation using charging point density as the instrumental variable for EV penetration.Finally,the robustness of the results is tested by replacing the dependent variable and refined subsample,respectively.The theoretical and empirical findings conclude that EVs affect carbon emissions through the use channel,the generation channel and the production channel,while the costs of developing EVs include the cost of infrastructure and the negative impact of the transformation of the automotive industry on output and employment.When controlling for other variables,EV penetration has a negative impact on carbon emissions and carbon intensity in the EU,the use of EVs has an emissions reduction effect.the moderating effects analysis shows that carbon intensity in the electricity sector has a dampening effect on this reduction effect,so that special attention needs to be paid to the development of clean energy when promoting the use of EVs.The Carbon Kuznets Curve for the EU as a whole is linear with a negative slope rather than quadratic,with population size,urbanization,per capita income and industrial share having a negative effect on carbon intensity,while an increase in the carbon intensity of the energy mix,the energy intensity of output and the carbon intensity of the electricity sector will worsen carbon emissions.A comprehensive understanding and grasp of the emission reduction effects of electric vehicles,and learning from the EU’s policy experience in developing electric vehicles,will be instructive for China to use new energy vehicles to promote lowcarbon economic development.The promotion of electric vehicles requires parallel administrative directives and economic instruments,allowing industrial policies to play a role in the market mechanism.The life-cycle emissions of electric vehicles suggest that we should not focus on tailpipe emissions alone,but should pay more attention to power generation and production and recycling,and that the development of electric vehicles must be accompanied by a change in the energy sector.