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Roadmap to decarbonising European cars

Transport is Europe’s biggest source of carbon emissions, contributing 27% to the EU’s total CO2 emissions, with cars representing 45% of these. Transport is also the only sector in which emissions have grown since 1990, driving an increase in the EU’s overall emissions in 2017. If the EU is to achieve the global Paris climate agreement goals of pursuing efforts to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5ºC, transport emissions must be reduced to zero by 2050 at the very latest, including emissions from passenger cars. This paper analyses options to achieve zero emissions in the EU car segment by 2050. It is designed to feed into the Commission’s current deliberations on 2050 climate scenarios.