In this very creative digital conference from CoMoUk, each of the expert speakers, including our founder and CEO, Sandra Phillips, were allowed five minutes to present their strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions within the UK (and globally) in preparation for COP26 next year. The conference audience then voted for their favourite, winning idea/topic in an online poll that was shared on their social media channels. ***Spoiler Alert***
Sandra’s strategy won with 52% of the vote!
What is COP26?
As we look to recover from the Covid crisis, we need to address the climate emergency. The COP26 event is a global united Nations summit about climate change and how countries are planning to tackle it. COP26 is the point at which the entire planet comes to an agreement on how to hit ‘reset.’ It was due to take place in Glasgow from 9 – 19 November with more than 200 world leaders due to attend, but when coronavirus arrived, that all changed. Cop26 was moved to 1 and 12 November 2021.
To learn more about creating smart mobility services for a sustainable future click here. Keeping reading to learn the key topics discussed across each COP26 pitch.
COMOUK Webinar: How To Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions in the UK
THE SPEAKERS
Dr. Duncan Booker, COP26 Stakeholder Manager, Glasgow City Council
Pitch: Sustainability and inclusivity must go hand in hand.
We know that transport as a sector is now the largest contributor to carbon emissions in the UK. Sustainability and social justice must go hand in hand. Particularly within vulnerable communities. The poorest households find it the hardest to access environmental resources such as energy, fresh food and forms of mobility. There is room for a free market, private sector response but also for the public sector to get involved. No one should be left behind.
“Actions to address the climate crisis must not further disadvantage people in communities who already experience significant inequalities.” – Glasgow Climate Emergency Report
We need to innovate, not just within technology, but also within cities and governments. How we do this is with and for our people.
Duncan Robertson, UK General Manager, Dott
Pitch: Sustainability must be embedded into all micromobility companies.
From a micromobility perspective, this industry has already been a force of positive change, reducing privately vehicle user-ship, reducing carbon emissions and improving public health. What can we do right now to help reduce climate change? Sustainability must be embedded in the essence of a company. A company can demand more from suppliers, for example; recycled materials, considered miles travelled and try sourcing closer where the product will be deployed. Trying to keep everything from design and manufacturing in-house.
Electrification is the future. Electric fleets, with swappable batteries and extended life spans, renewable power sources should be also included. Once the product has come to the end of its life, non-usable parts need to be recycled, giving batteries a second life and disposing of others properly. Local authorities need to include these measures in legislation and hold companies accountable.
Rachel Skinner, Executive Director (Transport) WSP
Pitch: Rapid progress towards better infrastructure systems.
We need to change, design, build and the implementation of transportation infrastructure, across the whole lifecycle of the entire system. Not just on the obvious systems like roads and railways but also the systems on which these rely, the energy systems, digital systems, the building assets and all the things that allow mobility to operate safely and coherently everyday and of course the vehicles that use them, to get to zero carbon emissions.
Sandra Phillips, Share Mobility Expert, Founder & CEO, movmi
Pitch: Focus on P3s to create a Swiss Army Knife for Personal Mobility.
The electrification of transportation, incentives for personal EVs, using curb and lane management and creating regulations around each are some ways to change personal mobility, but shared mobility will be the main antidote to personal vehicle ownership. Carsharing for longer trips and micromobility for shorter trips, combined with public transport, integrated mobility.
Case Study: Shared Mobility Compass Card
The Shared Mobility Compass Card is a true private public partnership pilot born out of TransLink’s Open Innovation Call. For the program, Translink Vancouver (public transport) integrated with Modo, Evo (carshare) and Mobi (bikeshare). The pilot ran from October 2019 to the end of August 2020 and focused on work-related travel with access to 4,000 vehicles via a unified access card. The results of the program show that creating seamless travel options, even if very little tech is used, is very appealing from a user perspective and will create behaviour shift towards more sustainable modes.
1. If you could change one policy in the UK over night what would it be?
- Duncan Robertson: Ban all cars from city centres in the extreme. Double the infrastructure spend on re-focusing streets away from cars.
- Rachel Skinner: Not sure if it’s about writing new policy but about being brave with the policies we currently have. Working together as opposed to finding the gaps.
- Sandra Phillips: Government bodies to think about the bigger picture and then design their policies around that.
- Dr. Duncan Booker: Pragmatic changes like offering skill workshops for people on how to install/fix a hydrogen fuel cell instead of a combustion engine. A green recovery.
2. SHOULD CITIES BE ABLE TO INTRODUCE SHARED MOBILITY OPTIONS AND HAVE devolved POWERS AWAY FROM NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS?
- Sandra Phillips: Yes, absolutely. Cities are king and queen makers. The challenge is, that every city starts to do its own thing, so across the bridge the license fee for example could be different. There needs to be over arching inter-municipality guidelines.
- Duncan Robertson: Exactly what Sandra described. For cities with multiple authorities there needs to be a wider view. There is scooter tender for up to three scooters to launch in London. Eleven of Thirty three burroughs have agreed.
- Dr. Duncan Booker: Pragmatic changes like offering skill workshops for people on how to install/fix a hydrogen fuel cell instead of a combustion engine. A green recovery.
3. Placemaking is a key tool. Non-traditional transport interventions can be cheaper. Thoughts?
Rachel Skinner: Everything comes together in places. The ideal solution is a set of mobility solutions that achieves the objectives in a bigger sense, but work for the people living and working in that community. We have the opportunity to bring that through and try out new and innovative interventions to see what different things work in different places.
Dr. Duncan Booker: We’ve shifted from the idea of planning, to a much greater community involvement model. We are going out to communities to talk about peoples pritorities for their areas. It gets people thinking about what is needed in their community.
3. WHY DO WE NEED SWAPPABLE BATTERIES IF WE HAVE GOOD ELECTRIC CHARGING INFRASTRUCTURE?
Duncan Robertson: Infrastructure requires higher capital cost and isn’t as versatile as the virtual hub parking solutions. With non-swappable batteries, you have to take the vehicle off the street to charge it. Availability is higher for swappable batteries. In the future, we will be seeing hybrid models of all these charging systems.
4. how should we organise multi-operator versus single operator. thoughts?
Sandra Phillips: There should be multi-operators offering the same business model. World-wide shared mobility is tapping into 1% of trips. You need a certain amount of vehicles to make the vehicle accessible for the user. They need a way to get were they are going and the more reliable these systems are, the more it will rival the personal car. However, the challenge of multi-operators is when cities begin introducing caps on fleets – it’s definitely a balance to reach your targets and make a profit.
Note: This article has not been endorsed or sponsored by any of the providers mentioned and there is no affiliation between movmi and them.
