IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v16y2024i15p6268-d1440511.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Divergences between EU Members on the Sustainability of Road Freight Transport

Author

Listed:
  • Manuel Manzanedo

    (Departamento de Digitalización, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Av. Cantabria, s/n, 09006 Burgos, Spain)

  • Carlos Alonso de Armiño

    (Departamento de Digitalización, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Av. Cantabria, s/n, 09006 Burgos, Spain)

  • Nuño Basurto

    (Departamento de Digitalización, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Av. Cantabria, s/n, 09006 Burgos, Spain)

  • Roberto Alcalde

    (Departamento de Economía y Administración de Empresas, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales, Universidad de Burgos, Pza. de la Infanta Dña. Elena, s/n, 09001 Burgos, Spain)

  • Belen Alonso

    (Departamento de Química, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Pza. de la Infanta Dña. Elena, s/n, 09001 Burgos, Spain)

Abstract

The Europevan Union is highly dependent on energy. This paper analyses energy consumption in the transport sector, representing approximately 30% of total energy consumption. A particular focus will be placed on road freight transport, which accounts for 40% of total transport energy consumption, trying to contribute to its rationalization. The road freight transport volume (TKM: tonne-kilometres) vs. gross domestic product (GDP) ratio fell in 2010–2022 by an average of 17.6% in EU-27, meaning that there was decoupled growth. Germany is the country with the highest decoupling, nearly 36%. On the contrary, in Spain there is a coupling because the evolution of TKM and GDP was almost identical. The paper proposes possible relevant factors in road freight transport activity that may justify the discrepancies in values within EU member countries, showing the positive and negative impacts of the different variables studied. In addition, the SARIMA model is applied to forecast the evolution of relevant indicators of road transport in different countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Manuel Manzanedo & Carlos Alonso de Armiño & Nuño Basurto & Roberto Alcalde & Belen Alonso, 2024. "Divergences between EU Members on the Sustainability of Road Freight Transport," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(15), pages 1-17, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:15:p:6268-:d:1440511
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/15/6268/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/15/6268/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Mehdi Abid & Maamar Sebri, 2012. "Energy Consumption-Economic Growth Nexus: Does the Level of Aggregation Matter?," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 2(2), pages 55-62.
    2. Chi, Junwook & Baek, Jungho, 2013. "Dynamic relationship between air transport demand and economic growth in the United States: A new look," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 257-260.
    3. Bennathan, Esra & Fraser, Julie & Thompson, Louis S., 1992. "What determines demand for freight transport?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 998, The World Bank.
    4. George N. Botzoris & Athanasios T. Galanis & Vassilios A. Profillidis & Nikolaos E. Eliou, 2015. "Coupling and Decoupling Relationships between Energy Consumption and Air Pollution from the Transport Sector and the Economic Activity," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 5(4), pages 949-954.
    5. Tae Hoon Oum, 1979. "A Cross Sectional Study of Freight Transport Demand and Rail-Truck Competition in Canada," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 10(2), pages 463-482, Autumn.
    6. E. Szimba & J. Ihrig & M. Kraft & K. Mitusch & M. Chen & M. Chahim & J. van Meijeren & J. Kiel & B. Mandel & A. Ulied & E. Larrea & G. De Ceuster & R. Van Grol & Z. Berki & A. Székely & R. Smith, 2018. "HIGH-TOOL – a strategic assessment tool for evaluating EU transport policies," Journal of Shipping and Trade, Springer, vol. 3(1), pages 1-30, December.
    7. Ruwan Jayathilaka & Chanuka Jayawardhana & Nilupul Embogama & Shalini Jayasooriya & Navodika Karunarathna & Thisara Gamage & Nethmali Kuruppu, 2022. "Gross domestic product and logistics performance index drive the world trade: A study based on all continents," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 17(3), pages 1-16, March.
    8. W. J. Baumol & H. D. Vinod, 1970. "An Inventory Theoretic Model of Freight Transport Demand," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 16(7), pages 413-421, March.
    9. Andreoni, V. & Galmarini, S., 2012. "Decoupling economic growth from carbon dioxide emissions: A decomposition analysis of Italian energy consumption," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 682-691.
    10. Stead, D., 2001. "Transport intensity in Europe -- indicators and trends," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 29-46, January.
    11. Crainic, Teodor Gabriel & Laporte, Gilbert, 1997. "Planning models for freight transportation," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 97(3), pages 409-438, March.
    12. Nadia Benali & Rochdi Feki, 2020. "Evaluation of the relationship between freight transport, energy consumption, economic growth and greenhouse gas emissions: the VECM approach," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 1039-1049, February.
    13. Tapio, Petri & Banister, David & Luukkanen, Jyrki & Vehmas, Jarmo & Willamo, Risto, 2007. "Energy and transport in comparison: Immaterialisation, dematerialisation and decarbonisation in the EU15 between 1970 and 2000," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 433-451, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yalan Zhao & Yaoqiu Kuang & Ningsheng Huang, 2016. "Decomposition Analysis in Decoupling Transport Output from Carbon Emissions in Guangdong Province, China," Energies, MDPI, vol. 9(4), pages 1-23, April.
    2. Larry Hughes & Moniek Jong & Zach Thorne, 2021. "(De)coupling and (De)carbonizing in the economies and energy systems of the G20," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(4), pages 5614-5639, April.
    3. Samir, Saidi & Shahbaz, Muhammad & Akhtar, Pervaiz, 2018. "The Long-Run Relationship between Transport Energy Consumption and Transport Infrastructure on Economic Growth in MENA Countries," MPRA Paper 85037, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 06 Mar 2018.
    4. Tao, Xuezong & Zhu, Lichao, 2024. "Drivers of transportation CO2 emissions and their changing patterns: Empirical results from 18 countries," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    5. Rui Jiang & Rongrong Li, 2017. "Decomposition and Decoupling Analysis of Life-Cycle Carbon Emission in China’s Building Sector," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-18, May.
    6. Papagiannaki, Katerina & Diakoulaki, Danae, 2009. "Decomposition analysis of CO2 emissions from passenger cars: The cases of Greece and Denmark," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 3259-3267, August.
    7. Rebeca Fontanilla Andong & Edsel Sajor, 2017. "Urban sprawl, public transport, and increasing CO2 emissions: the case of Metro Manila, Philippines," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 99-123, February.
    8. Dayong Wu & Changwei Yuan & Hongchao Liu, 2018. "The decoupling states of CO2 emissions in the Chinese transport sector from 1994 to 2012: A perspective on fuel types," Energy & Environment, , vol. 29(4), pages 591-612, June.
    9. Yi Li & Yan Luo & Yingzi Wang & Laili Wang & Manhong Shen, 2017. "Decomposing the Decoupling of Water Consumption and Economic Growth in China’s Textile Industry," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-17, March.
    10. Ferguson, Mark & Maoh, Hanna & Ryan, Justin & Kanaroglou, Pavlos & Rashidi, Taha Hossein, 2012. "Transferability and enhancement of a microsimulation model for estimating urban commercial vehicle movements," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 358-369.
    11. Loo, Becky P.Y. & Banister, David, 2016. "Decoupling transport from economic growth: Extending the debate to include environmental and social externalities," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 134-144.
    12. Saidi, Samir & Shahbaz, Muhammad & Akhtar, Pervaiz, 2018. "The long-run relationships between transport energy consumption, transport infrastructure, and economic growth in MENA countries," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 78-95.
    13. Rui Jiang & Yulin Zhou & Rongrong Li, 2018. "Moving to a Low-Carbon Economy in China: Decoupling and Decomposition Analysis of Emission and Economy from a Sector Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-12, March.
    14. Yao Bo Shi & Xin Xin Zhao & Chyi-Lu Jang & Chun-Ping Chang, 2019. "Decoupling effect between economic development and environmental pollution: A spatial-temporal investigation using 31 provinces in China," Energy & Environment, , vol. 30(5), pages 755-775, August.
    15. Achour, Houda & Belloumi, Mounir, 2016. "Investigating the causal relationship between transport infrastructure, transport energy consumption and economic growth in Tunisia," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 988-998.
    16. Rayaprolu, Hema & Levinson, David, 2024. "Co-evolution of public transport access and ridership," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    17. Nelson, Ewan & Warren, Peter, 2020. "UK transport decoupling: On track for clean growth in transport?," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 39-51.
    18. Coslovich, Luca & Pesenti, Raffaele & Ukovich, Walter, 2006. "Minimizing fleet operating costs for a container transportation company," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 171(3), pages 776-786, June.
    19. Lund, Henrik & Clark II, Woodrow W., 2008. "Sustainable energy and transportation systems introduction and overview," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 59-62, June.
    20. Hongyang Qiao & Sanmang Wu, 2025. "Decoupling Factor Analysis for Sustainable Development in China’s Four Municipalities Using the Tapio Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(6), pages 1-26, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:15:p:6268-:d:1440511. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.