November 24 2021

In this week’s blog post Lauren Pamma, Programme Director at Green Finance Institute and a speaker at our decarbonising coach event on 1 December, writes about the barriers operators face to transitioning to zero emission vehicles and how they could be tackled.

Road transport is the largest contributor to UK greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for more than a quarter of UK emissions in 2020, and makes a significant contribution to urban air pollution. The ability to move people and goods around the country is vital to both the economy and society, and decarbonising road transport is therefore critical if we are to achieve the Government’s Net Zero ambitions.

The bus and coach industry has an important role to play in transport decarbonisation, both through reducing the number of journeys taken by car and through the transition to zero emission vehicles. The barriers to achieving this are varied. Today’s zero emission vehicles are more expensive; installation of charging infrastructure can be costly and complex, and passenger numbers need to increase in order for the business case to make sense for operators.

Whilst there is no silver bullet, access to finance from the private as well as the public sector, can play a key role in enabling operators to invest in newer, cleaner vehicles. In the finance session we will dissect the barriers to transitioning to zero emission vehicles and explore existing and potential innovative solutions being developed by the finance sector and other market participants to overcome these. Cross sector collaboration between public and private finance, the bus and coach industry and Government is key to unlocking the capital required to achieve net zero transport. As such, I’m delighted to be speaking at the Zero Emission Coaches event on 1st December alongside Steven Meersman, Founder Director of Zenobe and Gary Mason, Engineering Director at Nottingham City Transport to highlight the crucial role of finance. I encourage members of CPT to sign up and join the conversation.

You can sign up to attend the conference here.