New Study Finds That Cyclists Cause 84% Lower CO2 Emissions

A study entitled ‘The climate change mitigation effects of active travel’, has produced detailed evidence to notion that cycling produces lower CO2 emissions than motoring.

More than 20 researchers from Stockholm to Oregon collected travel activity data from 3,836 participants over seven European cities to produce the new study which was published on 16th July 2020.

They found that the more people cycled or walked, the fewer mobility-related lifecycle CO2 emissions were generated.

Here are three of the study’s key findings:

  • Car travel generated 70% of daily mobility-related life cycle CO2 emissions, compared with the 1% generated by cycling;
  • Making one less car trip and one more bicycle trip a day decreased life cycle CO2 emissions from transport by 67%;
  • Cyclists had 84% lower daily travel lifecycle CO2 emissions than participants who did not cycle.

A longer version of this article was first published on the ECF (European Cyclists Federation) website.

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