Fair and Fast Decarbonisation of the Transport Sector: Integrating place into local and regional modelling and assessment tools.

This PhD will build new tools to enable local authorities, businesses and citizens understand what the rapid decarbonisation of transport could look like in their areas and, critically, how this can be done fairly and in ways which produce better health and economic outcomes for all.Shifting from 30 years of no progress in cutting carbon emissions from transport to zero carbon in the next two decades is a major challenge for policy makers, businesses and citizens. Different pathways are open which place different emphasis on demand management, behavioural change and technological adaptation substitution. These strategies will impact places and communities differently and how the transitions are managed will have important equity impacts. However, we do not have the tools necessary to look across transport and energy and to explore the importance of different local contexts. This PhD will develop new ideas to advance the agenda of place-based decarbonisation working in partnership with Arup.
There is a well established literature on the options available to decarbonise transport at both city and national scales (Brand et al., 2020; Gota et al., 2020; Creutzig, 2016). These studies focus on the complexity of the interactions between assumptions on how quickly electrification of vehicles will happen, alongside the potential for behavioural shifts and demand reduction and the extent to which actions will meet the carbon budget constraint. The application of this kind of approach is now beginning to flow through into the development of sub-national and local transport strategies (WYCA, 2020; LCC, 2021).
The gap which this study seeks to address is the spatial and social implications of the different choices.

The research will involve close partnership working with sub-national level governments to categorise current practice and to understand the key research gaps which the place-based approach will fill.