Over the past couple of years in this column I have discussed the difficulties of decarbonising the heavy vehicle road freight sector, an issue not just facing Australia, but a global problem.
I have also detailed that the Truck Industry Council (TIC) remains open to all forms of decarbonisation in the road freight sector, including new more fuel efficient trucks, hybrids, battery electric vehicles, freight productivity (moving more freight with fewer trucks), eTrailers, modal shift, hydrogen and any other decarbonising solution that may eventuate over the coming years.
In my column last month, I detailed the global headwinds that hydrogen was facing in the immediate term, suggesting that, while hydrogen will likely play a role in decarbonising transport over time, the immediate case for hydrogen trucks is selected trials to determine viable use cases and highlight any issues and problems that arise from the fuel and the technology.
In my October 2024 column I discussed the issue of sustainable, or renewable, or low carbon, fuels.
A brief recap of that piece; to start with, the term low carbon fuel is not technically correct, as these fuels have about the same carbon content as mineral diesel, that is where the energy of the fuel is derived.
Sustainable, or renewable fuel, is a more appropriate term, as these fuels are typically derived from plants that have captured CO₂ from the atmosphere whilst growing and that CO₂ is released again when the fuel is burnt in an internal combustion engine (ICE).
The result is no net gain in CO₂ released into the atmosphere.
There are some caveats that need to be applied to this process.
Energy will be required to grow, harvest, transport and process the plant crops to produce sustainable fuels and depending on how ‘green’ these processes are, will determine the level of CO₂ intensity of the fuel.
There are international carbon accounting measures that are used to calculate how sustainable a specific batch of fuel manufactured by this process is.
Currently, R100 (100 per cent renewable diesel) being used for truck and machinery trials in Australia, supplied from Singapore, offsets just over 90 per cent of CO₂ emissions when compared with mineral diesel.
Another issue that gets raised in sustainable fuel discussions is that of land use, food versus fuel crops, etc.
Currently Australia exports approximately 60 per cent of its canola crop to Europe and Asia for sustainable fuel production, whilst the majority of our used cooking oil is exported to the USA for their sustainable fuel manufacturing.
Were Australia to keep and process those feedstocks here, we would go close to providing enough renewable diesel to run our truck fleet on a R20 renewable diesel blend, without land use change, nor effecting the canola supply for food products.
An important part of the Albanese Government’s Future Made in Australia Innovation Fund is a Guarantee of Origin (GoO) scheme.
The intent of the GoO scheme is to track and verify emissions associated with low emissions products and provide an enduring mechanism to certify renewable electricity, green hydrogen, sustainable fuels, etc.
The scheme will help unlock economic opportunities for Australian industry to meet growing domestic and international demand for verified renewable power, fuels and other “clean” (green) products.
Sustainable fuels are proven technologies that are already being produced and adopted globally.
These products are immediately compatible with existing infrastructure and the Australian truck fleet.
They can serve as drop-in replacements for current mineral diesel.
With increasing demand for these products both domestically and internationally and with sustainable fuel projects in active development in Australia, these low carbon fuels will be key contributors to Australia’s decarbonisation pathway.
Given the widespread recognition of the readiness, availability, and feasibility of sustainable fuels, the missing piece is a GoO scheme that will allow these fuels to have verified renewable carbon intensity and permit users of these fuels to claim confirmed carbon abatement.
As you are reading this column, the Australian federal election, scheduled for early May, has probably been run and won and TIC cautions whoever has secured government to look and learn from global decarbonisation efforts and develop realistic policy settings that can work for the Australian road freight sector in the short- to mid-term.
This must include sustainable transport fuels with a Guarantee of Origin.
Tony McMullan CEO,
Truck Industry Council
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