We disagree with the portfolio perspective's assumption that all the cars of the future that are being developed today can and will co-exist in the future. Our alternative perspective, in which only a small subset of options will survive, has two major implications for transport and innovation policy today. First and foremost we argue that the different cars of the future will compete for dominance and the most desirable options are not necessarily the winners of this competition, but rather the subset of options that succeed in gaining an early lead in terms of production capacity and infrastructure build-up. Second, to breach the dominancy of today's car, a more focused approach is likely to be more successful as compared to the wide range of options that are put the fore in the portfolio perspective. That is, to compete with the economies of scale and network externalities of today's cars, the most desirable alternative designs need critical mass as well. While the portfolio perspective implies that all options should be supported and that specific support for one option does not harm any of the options, our perspective implies that supportive measures should be more focused on the most desirable designs. First and above all, technology agnostic GHG emissions regulation should provide an incentive to the market to develop cleaner cars. Second, the most desirable options will not emerge without specific support, as both economies of scale and network externalities are lacking, and specific measures are needed. One of the risks of technology specific support is that governments are notoriously incompetent in picking winners. However, deciding on the most desirable options, we believe, is less difficult and can be based on a number of basic principles. We propose to support only those options that are part of the electrification cluster. We do so, because a) ICE's are and will always be highly inefficient and their share in transport should ultimately be minimized, b) ICE's emit air pollutants that cause many health problems in densely populated areas, and most importantly c) the electrification of the powertrain paves the way for true zero-emission transport in combination with increasing shares of renewable energy in the energy and electricity mix. Even though the options from the alternative fuels cluster can help to reduce overall emissions in the transport sector, there is a risk that these vehicles block the successful introduction of electrified vehicles. Insofar as alternative fuels vehicles are necessary anyway for specific niche markets, they are likely to be developed by both the automotive and the energy industry anyway because of their fitness with today's technology and business models, regardless of governmental support. There is, we argue, thus no need to continue public support for these competitors of the truly desirable cluster of electric powertrains and governmental action should be focused on the latter.


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    Titel :

    Challenging the portfolio of powertrains perspective: Time to choose sides


    Beteiligte:

    Erschienen in:

    Erscheinungsdatum :

    2012


    Format / Umfang :

    5 Seiten, 1 Bild, 12 Quellen



    Medientyp :

    Aufsatz (Konferenz)


    Format :

    Print


    Sprache :

    Englisch




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