EA: Based on your experiences and your work with clients and stakeholders, how have low-carbon, energy-efficient transportation solutions evolved in recent years? What key advancements stand out to you?

Dana Lowell: The most striking change has been a significant increase in the number and types of electric vehicle (EV) models available on the market.  This is especially true in the light-duty space where, for the 2025 model year, there are now more than 70 EV models to choose from, including pickups and larger SUVs – and additional models that have already been announced and will be introduced over the next few years.  In the medium- and heavy-duty space there has been less progress, but we have still seen significant growth.  EVs have become significantly more capable as well – with larger batteries and range, as well as faster charging. 

We have seen a significant expansion of public charging infrastructure with federal and state investments, but also very significant investments and commitments by private companies to continue expanding the network.  For example, the California Energy Commission recently reported that there are now more public EV charging ports in California than gas pumps.  We also are seeing the development of truck charging hubs focused specifically on serving medium- and heavy-duty fleets with shared infrastructure in key locations.  

Increased availability of varied and -increasingly capable EVs combined with more charging infrastructure has made it much more practical for both individuals and fleets to adopt low-carbon transportation solutions.

Another trend we are seeing is increased interest in hydrogen as a low-carbon transportation solution. This is particularly true in the transit bus industry, a traditional early adopter of clean transportation technologies.  Over the past 2-3 years interest in hydrogen options has grown dramatically in transit.

 

EA: What are your recommendations for building a strong business case for the adoption of low-carbon transportation solutions, both at the project level and across broader organizational sustainability goals?

Dana Lowell: For cars and light trucks on the market today we are already approaching life-time cost parity between EVs and conventional gasoline vehicles.  In fact, modelling that we did last year shows net cost savings over 10 years for several current EV models compared to comparable gasoline models – including the Ford F150 Lighting.   This accounts for the cost of vehicle and charger, fuel, maintenance, insurance and taxes.  Economics are a bit tougher for current medium- and heavy-duty electric vehicles, but most public and commercial fleets include a significant number of smaller vehicles with potentially favourable economics for conversion to EVs – which is a good place to start.

One of the significant challenges I have seen over the years is under-investment in efficiency by fleets – even for conventional technologies that can be shown to have a 2-3-year payback through fuel cost savings.  It is not clear why, but personally I think it has to do with the way companies make decisions about capital allocation.   Fleets are typically seen as cost centers rather than profit centers, and corporate decision-making favors investment in business growth rather than improving existing operations.   

Of course, low-carbon transportation technologies provide additional benefits that don’t show up on a corporate balance sheet.  These benefits are not just related to climate; there are also significant public health benefits due to cleaner air, particularly in cities with high populations living close to traffic corridors.  Perhaps the key to strengthening the business case is to directly link these societal benefits to both real and intangible corporate benefits – for example reductions in climate risk and reduced costs for climate adaptation.  

 

EA: What challenges have you found when trying to achieve joined-up thinking across regions, and different transport modes with adapting policies?

Dana Lowell: The biggest challenge is lack of regional planning and decision-making structures.  In the transportation space there are regional planning organizations, but they typically only span a single or several adjoining Metropolitan regions while transportation corridors are much larger.   Even when coordinated regional planning is completed, decisions about funding and implementation are left to local officials.  On a positive note, we have recently seen more Metropolitan Planning Organizations engaging in region-wide planning for public charging infrastructure, which is a positive development. 

Specifically with respect to transportation electrification, the utility distribution companies (UDC) play a key role in providing the necessary power for EV charging.  After years of very flat load growth, they are now playing catch up as power demand ramps up. New investments are required to upgrade distribution systems – particularly to address high, concentrated loads for fleet charging.  Given utility regulatory structures and planning cycles, it is difficult for UDCs to understand and stay ahead of the demand in this dynamic environment – which is already leading to significant delays in completing many large fleet charging projects.  While this continues to be a challenge, we are starting to see some effort to address this need.  A good example is the Northeast Freight Corridors Charging Plan – an effort to assess the 20-year charging needs of heavy-duty freight trucks along 3,000 miles of major highways across nine states in the Northeast.  This study was funded by a grant from the Department of Energy and led by the utility National Grid but included participation by other regional utilities and many industry groups.  We need to find ways to encourage and expand these efforts.

 

EA: What are the primary barriers around measuring, monitoring, and reporting the impact of energy-efficient transportation solutions on cost reduction and sustainability goals? How can emerging technologies and data tools help address these challenges and improve transparency?

Dana Lowell: Most fleets do a good job of tracking vehicle fuel use and cost, and vehicle maintenance costs, from conventional gasoline and diesel vehicles — not always at the individual vehicle level, but at least at the fleet level.  Most EV chargers – even home chargers  – come standard with data reporting software that allows users to track EV energy use.  While it is not possible to directly track emissions associated with EV charging in real time, there is plenty of publicly available data that can be used to calculate average generation emissions in different geographies, even for specific utility companies.  It is therefore not particularly challenging to measure and report the impacts from replacing conventional vehicles with EVs and other low carbon vehicle technologies with a high degree of accuracy, though it can be labor intensive to collect, collate and analyze the data. 

It is more challenging to assess impacts from systemic or structural changes to the transportation system – for example, investments in public transportation.  The challenge is that you can measure what happens after the investment, but you can’t directly measure what would have happened without it; you can only infer what happened by reference to historical information.

Emerging technologies and data tools can help to make data collection and analysis easier and more efficient. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are very hot topics right now and have shown promise with predictive modelling and data interpretation across many fields. AI could potentially be used to address the lack of data standardization in this space or in navigating the complexities of measurement in ways we haven't considered.

Location intelligence (GIS) is another tool that is increasingly being used to improve stakeholder engagement by presenting information in visually clear and impactful ways. GIS can be used to improve transparency and get the public buy-in required to make shifts.

NextGen connectivity (6G networks and LEO satellites for seamless internet coverage) will allow for much improved data monitoring and data sharing and systems/machine-to-machine integration, further addressing measurement challenges.

Use of these technologies to more efficiently collect and analyse data can make reporting impacts from energy-efficient transportation solutions easier and less expensive. As we become better at storing, managing, accessing and extracting from these huge datasets, we obtain the kind of information needed to make smarter, defensible decisions.