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[en] Vehicle automation is coming, but environmental and energy imperatives are NOT what’s motivating it. In fact, its energy and environmental outcomes are deeply uncertain. The promise of autonomous vehicles (AVs) is greater safety and mobility. The question is: How do we achieve that promise while reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and saving energy? Future AV scenarios range widely, from dramatically higher to dramatically lower GHG emissions. Fortunately, the best case for the environment is also the best case for business, for the economy, and for safe and affordable mobility: autonomous Taxi fleets that operate clean vehicles, encourage ridesharing, and are integrated with other public and private transportation modes. Governments, businesses, drivers and riders make decisions that can increase or decrease the likelihood of the best-case scenario. The stakes are very high, as the transportation sector is now the largest source of U.S. GHG emissions. Emissions are equal to (1) emissions per-vehicle-mile, multiplied by (2) vehicle-miles traveled (VMT). This paper explores the business, technology and behavioral decisions with respect to automation that have the greatest impact along these two dimensions. It then identifies policy interventions that could influence these key decisions to achieve the best GHG outcomes. AVs are an important international issue, although this paper is focused on the United States.

[en] Simulating pedestrian mobility is a typical centralized problem where each agent must interact with a plurality of other agents in order to make decisions about its local path planning. Distrimobs is a parallel- and distributed-agent-based pedestrian mobility simulator able to represent thousands of agents while keeping a good scalability. The aim of the Distrimobs simulator is to simulate the whole Carnival of Venice. In this work we present the Distrimobs approach for parallelization of the computations and some experimental results of performance intensive scenarios. These results highlight the scalability and the computational complexity of the simulator.

[en] This paper presents a study of the state of art and prospects for production and use biofuels in transport of Latvia. The main goal of this investigation was to find out the ways and methods how to overcome barriers, which hinder the introduction and analyze the possibilities of wider and faster introduction of biofuels in Latvia. Scenarios of introduction the biofuels for different kinds of transport were worked out. The paper mainly focuses on the existing situation, perspectives and future targets. It takes a look at different aspects, which could help to create preconditions for development of biofuels as a new sector in Latvian agriculture and industry

[en] Taxi and limousine service plays an important role in the movement of people within a city. In 2004, the total revenue in this industry in Canada was $1.305 billion, and an estimated 35,339 carriers served the industry. In Canada, economic and safety regulations of taxi supply were imposed in most cities during the 1930s and 1940s and continue to this date. Although the industry is regulated, the competition law also applies. The appropriateness of these regulations continues to be challenged and regulatory reforms in the major cities in Canada have concentrated their efforts on increasing the rate of services, improving the quality of vehicles and enhancing the training of taxi drivers. Indicators for the 1999-2004 period reveal that the taxi and limousine industry in Canada did not perform very well. Revenue increased by only 1.7 per cent per year and margins deteriorated by -1.78 per cent together with the operating ratio. The purpose of this paper was to examine the taxi and limousine industry in Canada. First, the structure of the industry in Canada was examined followed by a review of the economic regulation of the industry. Recent regulatory developments in Canada and in other countries were then reviewed with arguments for or against deregulation. 28 refs., 2 tabs

[en] 'Full text:' The paper presents the latest fuel cell technology progress in China and its application in field of transportation. The units who are engaged in fuel cell technology and fuel cell products will be introduced and their applications in light fuel cell vehicles and fuel cell cars as well as fuel cell buses will be included. (author)

[en] The Norwegian Federation of Trade Unions and the Norwegian Labour Party set down a committee to investigate the application potential for the Norwegian natural gas and to develop a strategy for its use. This report presents their conclusions. It discusses (1) The increased value added through product development in which natural gas is the resource, (2) What must be done to land offshore pipelines at strategic places along the coast, (3) Increased use of gas/hydrogen in the transportation sector, (4) A more environmentally friendly energy policy, (5) Point out areas in which Norway may play a leading role in the future. The committee concludes that (1) The domestic use of natural gas should cover 10% of the total production within ten years, (2) A state-owned company that invests in infrastructure for gas distribution should be established, (3) Prepare fore increased use of natural gas within the constraints imposed by international climate commitments, (4) An active transition to more environmentally friendly use of natural gas, (5) Increased public priority to electrification of the North Sea activities as an environmental project in a class by itself, (6) A company shall be established for the development of environmentally friendly energy technology, (7) Increased utilization of carbon dioxide as an industrial by-product, without adverse environmental consequences

[en] Emission utilization permission is an interesting but complex issue regarding the environmental effect of pollution. This paper proposes a mathematical programming–based approach to emission utilization permission taking environmental efficiency into consideration. We use this approach for an environmental efficiency analysis and emission utilization permission (extra emission permission) of selected economic sectors in Iran, namely, agriculture, oil, industry, transportation, and domestic, commercial, and public. We use a gradually decreasing scheme for the process of emission utilization permission to investigate the condition of each sector during the process. The result reveals a vital need of improvement for two sectors, namely, oil sector and transportation sector, at the end of emission utilization permission process that is very tight in terms of emission permission.

[en] This presentation discusses alternative fuel cycles to reduce greenhouse gases. It proposes a greater use of nuclear energy to replace coal-fired plants and hydrogen use in the transportation sector