Development of an Assessment Tool of the Effects of ITS on CO2 Emissions

Some Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) technologies are expected to effectively reduce energy consumption and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from vehicular highway traffic, which contributes about 20 % of CO2 emissions in Japan. The paper proposes a classification of ITS solutions regarding their effects on the reduction. A newly developed method, consisting of a traffic simulation (TS), an emission model (EM) and a harmonization of those models, is introduced, and its efficiency and reliability are examined by a verification and validation procedure. The procedure is collaboratively developed with specialists from the EU and USA during a 5-year research activity between 2008 and 2013. Application trials of the method are also demonstrated and the effectiveness of the developed method proved to be applicable for evaluating the reduction of vehicular traffic CO2 emissions.