New article "Clear Roads and Dirty Air? Indirect effects of reduced private traffic congestion on emissions from heavy traffic"

In December 2022, a paper by Dr. Christin Hoffmann and Prof. Dr. Kirsten Thommes was published on the relationship between traffic density, truck driver behavior, and emissions.

The new article "Clear Roads and Dirty Air" by Dr. Christin Hoffmann and Prof. Kirsten Thommes has been published as an open access publication in the Journal of Cleaner Production.

Clear Roads and Dirty Air? Indirect effects of reduced private traffic congestion on emissions from heavy traffic - ScienceDirect

Measures aimed at reducing car traffic could backfire from an environmental perspective due to potential reactions from truck drivers. Less traffic could lead to truck drivers either driving more fuel-efficiently - or, and this would be destructive for the CO2 balance; they could be tempted to drive particularly fast. The authors examined a unique dataset of 700 truck drivers for changing traffic conditions during the corona pandemic.

An overview of the study's findings:

  • We find a U-shaped relationship between traffic density and truck emissions.
  • Optimal traffic density reduces emissions as much as removing the 10% worst drivers from the road.

Contact

Dr. rer. oec. Christin Hoffmann
Energiewirtschaft
T +49 (0) 355 69-4161
christin.hoffmann(at)b-tu.de