Written evidence submitted by Newcastle University (EVP0115)

Executive summary

1. Newcastle University is a world-leading research-intensive university. Every day our teams are advancing knowledge, providing creative solutions, and solving global problems to provide benefits to individuals, to organisations, and to society as a whole.

2. This submission provides an overview of Newcastle University’s globally-leading work on zero emissions vehicles alongside responses to some of the Committee’s specific questions on this topic. It also sets out detail on how the work of Newcastle University’s Urban Observatory can support the UK in decarbonising road transport and developing an innovative approach to road pricing.

3. This submission is in four parts:

­       An overview of our relevant work;

­       An introduction to Newcastle University’s Urban Observatory and how it can support data-led policy making in this area;

­       A vision for data-led road pricing, developed and tested in Newcastle; and

­       Responses to the Committee’s specific questions on zero emissions vehicles.

4. We would welcome the opportunity to brief the Committee on this work in further detail and provide any further information which would be helpful.

Overview of Newcastle University’s work

5. Newcastle University is a world leader in energy, data, shaping future transport, and infrastructure. Home to the National Centre for Energy Systems Integration, National Innovation Centre for Data, the Centre for Energy (a Newcastle University Centre of Research Excellence), the Urban Observatory, and other world leading programmes, the University’s work is at the heart of the transition to net zero. We work collaboratively with policymakers, industry and academia – locally, regionally and nationally – to identify and solve the main questions and challenges facing the UK.

6. Newcastle University owns Zero Carbon Futures (ZCF), a North East based company that provides insight into low carbon vehicles and associated technologies enabling the development of strategies to reduce carbon emissions from transport. The recent acquisition will allow Newcastle University to provide a larger platform for ZCF, through its research specialisms in transport, electric vehicles, and sustainability. ZCF will bring a wealth of experience project managing multimillion-pound projects, skills delivery, and electric vehicles strategies for cities such as London, Manchester, and Milton Keynes.

7. Newcastle University is also the leader of a national network of four cutting edge Driving the Electric Revolution Centres, putting our work at the heart of enabling faster collaborative research and development of electric transport, including cars, planes, and ships.

8. The Driving the Electric Revolution Centres are backed by £30 million of government funding and will provide open access facilities with state-of-the-art equipment, bringing together the UK’s technology and manufacturing expertise in electrification research and development.

9. The centres will help businesses across numerous sectors to invest and work together to capitalise on the UK’s strengths in this technology, propelling UK manufacturing to the forefront of global efforts to tackle climate change and ensure the UK can reach net zero emissions by 2050.

10. Newcastle University was one of the first UK institutions to conduct research on electric vehicles and the North East region has been at the forefront of the electric vehicle revolution, spearheaded by the 2010 OLEV-funded Plugged in Places (PIP) programme in concert with the Innovate UK-funded SwitchEV electric vehicle trial project. The North East early on had the largest electric vehicle charging network in Europe which informed policy both in the UK and across Europe on charging behaviour and likely demands on the electricity system.  Further research in the TEN-T funded RCN project, which installed 78 rapid chargers across the UK, informed OZEV (then OLEV) on the benefits of rapid charging networks, how EV use changed as a result, and the business case for investment in rapid chargers.

11. As a founding institution of the Faraday Institution, Newcastle University has been a key player in world-leading research to overcome challenges in current battery technology, focusing on extending battery life, recycling and re-using batteries, next generation batteries and battery system modelling. This work has unlocked significant investment and will play a key role in supporting the government’s ambition for the UK to be a world leader in battery technology and manufacturing.

12. The University takes a cross-disciplinary approach to its research, capitalising on the depth and breadth of our academics’ knowledge and expertise. Our behavioural research has already, through projects like SwitchEV and RCN, and will continue to play a key role in helping government to understand driver behaviour, charging behaviour and willingness to pay. This will enable government to make the right policy decisions to encourage uptake and create a fit for purpose national charging infrastructure that will encourage late adopters to feel comfortable in adopting electric vehicles.

13. The University, city, and region are well placed to support the government in developing, trialling, and deploying innovative approaches to boosting electric vehicle manufacturing and uptake. We are keen to work closely with policymakers to reach the UK’s transport decarbonisation ambitions.

The Urban Observatory: Informing data-led policymaking to decarbonise transport

This section of the submission has been prepared by Professor Philip James, Professor of Urban Data at Newcastle University, Director of the Newcastle Urban Observatory, and co-lead of the National Observatory Programme.

14. Data is crucial for good policymaking. Newcastle University’s Urban Observatory holds the UK’s largest set of mobility and environment data and is also working closely as part of the Urban Observatory programme – funded by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy via the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) – with five other cities and institutions to build a nationwide data network which can help inform policy development and our understanding of ‘smart cities’.

15. Over the last five years, Newcastle University has deployed sensors, which measure a range of variables from air quality to traffic flows around the city, and has worked with stakeholders, such as Go North East and the North East Combined Authority Urban Traffic Management Centre, to integrate their data streams. The result is a city-wide infrastructure system which provides real-time data of activity in and around the city of Newcastle.

16. This is the most expansive set of mobility and environmental data in the UK, with: over 74 urban indicators; 7,000 observations every minute; 3,600 sensor streams; 9 billion data points; 540 CCTV sensors; and hundreds of millions of images. The data is provided openly and in real time via a dashboard and API.

17. During Covid-19, this extensive data hub has been rapidly repurposed into a tool which can help policymakers understand the impact of policy decisions on Covid-19 restrictions on the ground, in real-time. Data has also been drawn from other cities, including Sheffield and Hull, building a picture of the impact of Covid-19 and government measures away from London, in the northern heartlands the government has promised to ‘level up’.

18. The work of the Urban Observatory can also offer vital support to recovery efforts and, particularly, meeting the UK’s decarbonisation targets. Our data can help to inform plans and design and provide immediate feedback on any changes, which would usually take months of consultation to collect. Given this project has run for five years, we have developed long baselines of data which allow the impact of interventions to be monitored over time.

19. Using this data infrastructure, policymakers can monitor the impact of policy decisions on air quality, for example, as well as understand energy consumption and usage as we undergo the complex transition to net zero. We work with city and regional partners to assess the impacts of intervention, covering efficacy, unintended consequences, and ripple effects from small interventions.

20. Combining the University’s world-leading research on energy and transport, our extensive data infrastructure, and our close partnership with key city stakeholders, means Newcastle can also lead the way on zero emissions vehicles. The University is ideally suited to monitor and analyse policy and interventions on zero emissions vehicles, as it has done for the past decade, and we can design robust experiments and analyse impacts across sectors and scales.

21. Our approach supports the instant integration of new data. For example, we are working in partnership with Newcastle City Council on a new e-scooter trial, which will see the Observatory collect and analyse data on how e-scooters are used across the city as we are also doing with e-cargo robots. There is also significant potential for Newcastle, through the co-operation of the University and local government, to act as a test bed for the rest of the country on driving forward use of zero emissions vehicles.

22. Newcastle University, through the Observatory, can evaluate the impact of measures against a baseline – including improved air quality, better travel times, increased pedestrian footfall, and quicker bus journeys. Our rich data can allow Newcastle to be a test bed for experimentation, using our understanding of the ‘before’ and the means of measuring intended and unintended consequences. In practice, this could look like a highly monitored set of locations in the city, a bespoke deployment to support an intervention, and data analytics post-intervention. Newcastle has all of these moving parts in place already.

Exploring an innovative, data-led approach to road pricing

This section of the submission was also prepared by Professor Philip James, with support from colleagues working on the decarbonisation of transport.

23. Air quality in cities is subject to both human and environmental drivers and the adoption of zero emissions vehicles will play a key role in improving air quality. However, the government must consider how to fiscally incentivise the adoption of zero emissions vehicles as well as discouraging the use of polluting vehicles. Adaptive road pricing is one way government can do this.

24. Newcastle University has had a long history of innovating in the road pricing area, being part of the consortia that developed the first non-stop multi-lane tolling system, installing the first trial of road pricing into the UK through the Cambridge Congestion Metering system in 1993-95 and supporting the then DoT through their motorway tolling trials and the DIRECT road pricing trials.

25. Using real-time data, provided by the likes of the Urban Observatory, and advanced AI opens up the possibility for innovative solutions, such as a data driven approach to road pricing.

26. Newcastle University is beginning to consider how its data could be used to develop a more effective policy on congestion charges, which includes adaptive pricing. The air quality data collected could be coupled with machine learning to help predict what air quality levels will be over time. This could provide the information needed for policymakers to set a varying congestion charge to discourage traffic when air pollution levels are high.

27. Newcastle University and Newcastle as a city are uniquely positioned to develop, test and deploy these solutions, given their expertise in road pricing and utilising the Observatory which has the largest environmental and infrastructure monitoring solutions already in place. Specifically, Newcastle has the densest network of air quality sensors in the UK, providing the data for further advanced AI to develop nowcasting (prediction of the present and very near future) and accurate predictions of air quality, combining traffic, air quality and climatic data in real-time.

28. These data-driven solutions could provide accurate near future predictions, e.g. over a 24-hour horizon, and would allow dynamic road pricing to be adjusted (from £0 upwards) depending on air quality forecasts and targets, thereby disincentivising the use of polluting vehicles when air quality levels are low. One challenge to investigate would be how drivers would perceive and accept a variable charge (i.e. not necessarily knowing how much a journey is going to cost due to the dynamic pricing associated with air quality).

29. Given the extensive network of air quality monitoring in Newcastle, with over 200 sensors across the area, this road pricing system could also account for geographic variability.

30. To support the modal shift to public transport necessary for decarbonisation and to improve air quality levels, road pricing could also be linked directly to a public transport subsidy – encouraging public transport travel on days of poor air quality. Over time, the system could be tuned to encourage this modal shift long-term. This requires AI and a significant improvement in transport and travel data, so travellers can make informed decisions and be ‘nudged’ to choose more sustainable travel options.

31. This approach would also improve public support by increasing transparency and the visibility of air quality levels for the public. Road charging regimes may be more agreeable and palatable to the public if they are directly linked to the air that we, and our children, breathe.

32. The work of Newcastle University’s Urban Observatory allows holistic data covering the whole city to be employed to develop sustainable solutions to the country’s decarbonisation challenge. Success and failure of interventions can be monitored in real time to inform future policy implementations. It enables speed and agility in decision making, through instant access to the relevant data.

33. Key to supporting this infrastructure is ensuring open standards and making data available. Systems need to be able to speak to each other and have uniform ways of collecting and presenting data, in order to be truly effective and provide value for policymaking. Developing such a framework should be a key focus for government, and Newcastle University would welcome the opportunity to share its expertise and collaborate on creating a framework for open data.

Responses to the Committee’s specific questions on zero emissions vehicles

This section of the submission has been prepared by Dr Colin Herron CBE, Managing Director of Zero Carbon Futures and Visiting Professor at Newcastle University.

34. The feasibility, opportunities, and challenges presented by the acceleration of the ban of the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles to 2030

• The challenge is that a supply chain and capacity must be built within the new trading agreement with the EU, in a very short time frame. Vehicle platforms have to be designed, manufacturing plants modified or decommissioned, as well as many thousands of staff retrained. The opportunity for the UK is to establish a viable e-mobility supply chain.

• With regard to feasibility, it is a fact that, if there is not enough investment in battery plants worldwide there will not be enough vehicles. If there is not enough supply for all the countries, which are setting 2030 as a target, then some will lose out. If the UK quota of electric vehicles does not count towards the EU fleet average requirements, then the UK will need to introduce fines like the EU, to ensure a supply of circa 2 million vehicles. Even with the known future battery capacity in Europe, it is problematical that the UK will secure enough vehicles of enough types to satisfy the market.  With a vehicle churn in the UK of about 3 million vehicles a year, how confident can we be that 3 million ultra-low emissions vehicles will be available for sale in the UK by 2030 to satisfy the churn?

35. The actions required by government and private operators to encourage greater uptake of electric vehicles and the infrastructure required to support them

• Newcastle University-owned Zero Carbon Futures has advised local authorities on strategies for the adoption of electric vehicles for several years. The challenge we face is to install the appropriate, viable infrastructure to meet the expected registrations over time, across the whole of the UK.

• The uptake of electric vehicles in the UK is dependent upon the supply of affordable vehicles, not charger numbers. The technology of the charging infrastructure and the vehicles need to be matched, with normalised electric vehicle charging behaviours of the driver established. As it stands, we have a nascent market, which requires research to establish the drivers’ preferred charging method and location. We have no model of actual need by type, number, or location and therefore we have no national strategy for the rollout of the correct infrastructure. We currently see the private and public sector in direct competition, which is some cases is leading to oversupply and underutilisation in some areas.

• Having some better models to inform on the optimal location of electric vehicle charges is something stakeholders have advised OZEV to make a priority in the past, such an adequate model does not yet exist. To inform the model, better data on recharging behaviour is required, and the North East of England has been pivotal in pioneering the collection and use of such data. Moreover, we need to understand how behaviour will change with different travel patterns, for example electric vehicles with larger batteries.

• Even with the good number of new electric vehicles purchased, published by The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) monthly, the electric vehicle and ultra-low emissions vehicle market is still on a small percentage. Looking at technology adoption models, we are nowhere near getting the mass adopters of electric vehicles into the market in any significant numbers yet. There is an optimism-bias that it will happen, however we feel OZEV needs to better understand the customer.

36. The particular challenges around decarbonising buses and how these should be addressed

• The challenge is to determine which technology is to be adopted within local authorities. The choice is between battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell, and it is believed that the bus operator will decide which technology to achieve the emission standards set by a Local Authority, unless, like London, the authority has control of its buses.

• Unlike diesel versus petrol, the infrastructure question is complex. The main control feature is the supply of electricity at the point of use (not the grid). Cities and large towns normally have the supply required but rural towns may not, which is a challenge for pure electric buses.

• The lack of electricity is also a challenge for hydrogen, as considerable amounts of electricity is required to produce green hydrogen. The lack of power could see hydrogen being transported in tankers to sites, as fuel is now, which reduces the efficiency. However, conversely, if hydrogen can be made by renewable electricity which, at times, no one else wants, the cost of production could be very low.

• Interoperability is also a challenge, if say Manchester chose battery electric and Liverpool chose hydrogen, this would see either dual infrastructure required or ‘islands of technology’. This may be necessary as we do not yet understand the full pros and cons of electric versus hydrogen buses. For example, having 3 tonnes of lithium batteries on a bus is both a use of a scarce resource and a mass that needs to be transported before the bus does anything useful.

• Looking at bus use cases, we believe that some buses which require longer duty cycles or operate in a substantially ‘hilly’ environment may be more suited to hydrogen. We are very supportive of the Teeside Hydrogen Transport Hub and the opportunity to undertake R&D to understand some of the unanswered questions of the role hydrogen may play across all the transport modes.

37. The government’s ambition to phase out the sale of new diesel heavy goods vehicles, including the scope to use hydrogen as an alternative fuel

• There is a policy in South Korea and Japan to pursue hydrogen for goods vehicles, however the very large vehicles on European roads are not a feature of either countries’ transport system.

• The European heavy goods vehicle (HGV) makers are currently reaching their decisions as to hydrogen versus battery. Scania has just announced it is dropping hydrogen as an option, but other manufacturers have not yet made their intentions clear.

• To some extent, the issue is that most countries have gone headlong down the electrification route and it is only in the past few years that hydrogen has been mooted as part of the solution for HGVs.  The demand for innovation to increase efficiency and reduce costs of hydrogen production have just become apparent, so the industry needs time to deliver. This is similar to the leap of faith we had with electromobility 11 years ago when batteries were expensive, drives were inefficient, and electricity from the grid was high in CO2.

• In short, the UK will have to accommodate what the overseas heavy goods vehicle producers ship to us and shape the small HGV manufacturing industry in the UK to be able to deliver hydrogen solutions for use cases unsuited for electric transport. 

• What is exciting is the UK has indigenous industries who can supply all the components necessary for hydrogen generation and storage, and for use in transport. Hydrogen could therefore be a key element of the UK’s green industrial revolution and Newcastle has a wide range of skills, experience and expertise to support this.

Next steps

38. Newcastle University and the Urban Observatory are leading exciting work which can help the government accelerate the decarbonisation of transport. We would be delighted to provide further evidence, or speak with the Committee, about any element of this submission as part of the inquiry or your wider work.

February 2021