Car trip changes could slash European cities emissions by 500 tonnes

This is under assumptions that travellers switch to bicycles for 22.5% of their trips.

Travellers in European cities can slash their emissions by up to 500 tonnes, if they replace up to 22.5% of their car trips, McKinsey reported. 

In its McKinsey global 2022 ACES consumer survey, McKinsey found that car owners estimated that they could replace up to 22.5% of kilometres they travel by car with some type of micromobility. This includes bicycles, e-kickscooters, and mopeds amongst others. 

“The size of the car parc would drop from about 520,000 vehicles to around 400,000, reducing emissions,” McKinsey noted.

“After factoring in the emissions associated with bicycle manufacture, we estimated that total annual emissions would fall by about 500 tonnes in our hypothetical city. This reduction is equivalent to the annual emissions generated by about 71,000 Europeans, which represents about 7% of the city’s population.”

This would also increase green spaces by freeing up about 1.4 square kilometres of space currently used as parking. 

Moreover, this could lower wastes by about 8 million tonnes and reduce water consumptions by about 40 billion litres.