The Portuguese government presented a plan, on the eve of the COP24, to decarbonise its economy by 2050, which includes a way to decarbonize 98.5% of your transportation industry. The plan presented focuses on the reduction of unnecessary trips, the promotion of public transport, shared transport and mobility models, and the integration of renewable energies, instead of an instantaneous change in energy policy towards electric transport.

In the transport sector, Portugal has set itself the goal of reducing emissions by 50% by 2030, 84% by 2040, and 98.50% by 2050, as reported by The Energy Newspaper. Emissions would not disappear one hundred percent, so a prominent role is reserved for renewable biofuels. The plan assumes that certain types of transportation, such as aviation, shipping, and long-distance transportation, are not easy to electrify. By 2030, it is intended that biofuels account for 25% of consumption.

Regarding automobiles, the Portuguese government believes it possible that by 2040 a third of journeys will be made using shared mobility, pointing out that, currently in Europe, vehicles are stationary 92% of the time and transport as many as only 1.5 people per trip. By 2043, all vehicles would be fully electric.

Portugal’s efforts can be framed within the objective of the European Commission to ensure that the common bloc becomes the first major low carbon economy before 2050. Some of the key elements of the strategy presented by the EC on November 28 include planting trees and underground capture of greenhouse gases such as methane and carbon dioxide.

A low carbon economy is an economy that emits a minimum of greenhouse gases into the biosphere, and specifically a minimum of carbon dioxide. The European Union plans to achieve this thanks to the increase in obtaining electricity through existing technologies such as solar and wind energy up to 80% of the total. Energy efficiency measures are also proposed, such as the thermal insulation of homes, in order to reduce energy consumption by half before the middle of the century.

The presentation of these efforts around COP24 coincides in time with the worrying news that, in 2018, CO2 emissions have not decreased, but have increased globally for the first time in four years.

The EC assures that the measures will make it possible to meet the objectives of the Paris Agreement, and that, despite the amount of investment required, they will help GDP grow by 2% by 2050. The measures would allow energy exports to increase reduce up to 70%, which represents a saving of three billion euros.