Greenhouse gas emissions from Thailand’s transport sector: Trends
and mitigation options
Jakapong Pongthanaisawan , Chumnong Sorapipatana
The Joint Graduate School of Energy and Environment, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, Bangmod, Tungkru, Bangkok 10140, Thailand
Center for Energy Technology and Environment, Commission on Higher Education, Ministry of Education, Bangkok 10140, Thailand
a b s t r a c t
Rapid growth of population and economy during the past two decades has resulted in continuing growth of transport’s oil demand and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The objectives of this study are to examine pattern and growth in energy demand as well as related GHG emissions from the transport sector and to analyze potential pathways of energy demand and GHG emissions reduction from this sector of the measures being set by the Thai Government. A set of econometric models has been developed to estimate the historical trend of energy demand and GHG emissions in the transport sector during 1989–2007 and to forecast future trends to 2030. Two mitigation option scenarios of fuel switching and energy efficiency options have been designed to analyze pathways of energy consumption and GHG emissions reduction potential in Thailand’s transport sector compared with the baseline business-as-usual (BAU) scenario, which assumed to do nothing influences the long-term trends of transport energy demand. It has been found that these two mitigation options can reduce the GHG emissions differently. The fuel-switching option could significantly reduce the amount of GHG emissions in a relatively short time frame, albeit it will be limited by its supply resources, whereas the energy efficiency option is more effective for GHG emissions mitigation in the long term. Therefore, both measures should be implemented simultaneously for both short and long term mitigation effects in order to more effectively achieve GHG emissions reduction target.
Keywords:
Greenhouse gas emissions
Transport sector
Energy efficiency
Fuel switching
Thailand
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 28 September 2010
Received in revised form 5 September 2011
Accepted 16 September 2011
Available online 19 October 2011
