Decarbonising shared mobility: The potential of shared electric vehicles

Car-sharing services offer potential to reduce dependency on private cars, and their electrification may decarbonise the transportation sector even further. This study estimates the potential emission reduction if shared cars operated by GoCar- a car-sharing service in Ireland- are electrified and assesses which trips could be completed using shared electric vehicles (EVs). Based on historical and targeted growth scenarios, appropriate forecasting methods were explored to predict GoCar's fleet size and travel distance for 2030. The corresponding emissions were estimated using COPERT. Results showed that electrifying half of the GoCar fleet by 2030 can reduce total emissions by up to 45% compared with baseline, whereas emissions were elevated by 50% compared to 2021 fleet operations. Results also suggest that the majority (70% to 90%) of GoCar day bookings can be completed using the available EVs in the Irish market, indicating the feasibility of EVs in car-sharing services.