City of Greater Bendigo targets transport emissions highlighted by Climate Council

The Climate Council, as part of a ten-point roadmap to tackle emissions, claims by 2030 transport emissions in Australia should be at least cut in half with close to all new car sales being zero-emission.

To achieve this goal, a Climate Council spokesperson said there will need to be both a significant improvement in public transport infrastructure and its uptake.

City of Greater Bendigo climate change and environment manager Michelle Wyatt said council was looking to the future working alongside the Greater Bendigo Climate Collaboration to build foundational next steps for the city.

One of these steps includes the recently held transport forum.

Some of the solutions being investigated locally include increasing electric vehicle charging infrastructure in the city, electrifying commercial fleets and electrifying our buses.

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Installing separated bikeways, improving walkways, activating public spaces and improving the comfort, connectivity and frequency of public transport are other pathways to reduced emissions council is investigating, Ms Wyatt said.

"As these ideas illustrate, electric vehicles are only part of the solution to reducing emissions from transport," she said.

"In terms of electric vehicles, the main barriers to increasing take up are cost and supply.

"This is due to manufacturers sending their electric vehicles to other countries which have stricter fuel efficiency standards."

Ms Wyatt said addressing this issue of fuel efficiency standards has been identified in the Climate Council's roadmap which, if addressed, will help the growth of electric vehicles.

"Australia has a low uptake of electric vehicles compared with other nations, in 2020 only 0.075 per cent of new cars purchased in Australia were electric," she said.

"Bendigo is no different - the most recent data from the ABS Motor Vehicle Census 2020 shows there were 23 electric vehicles registered in the Greater Bendigo Region in 2020.

"However, it is expected that this number has risen in the past two years."

Ms Wyatt said the federal government is working on an electric vehicle policy position which is due later this year.

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The Bendigo Council team and partners are analysing the outputs of the renewable energy and sustainable transport forums to put together an action plan for the city.

The plan will detail the projects that can be implemented as well as the advocacy required and the research needed to reach zero emissions by 2030.

"The next step will then be to work with our partners and community to get going on implementation," Ms Wyatt said.

"Globally solving the climate crisis is a diabolical policy issue - locally it is an economic development opportunity which is good for the people and good for the planet.

"The journey to zero emissions provides Bendigo with a chance to transform and improve our energy, food and transport sectors and build a local circular economy for our city."

The Climate Council's science-backed plan to turbocharge the national race to zero emissions has identified ten key demands including implementing mandatory fuel efficiency standards as soon as possible to boost the supply of electric vehicles and working with states and territories to ditch diesel buses for renewable-powered ones.

The plan has also targeted other sectors with significant emissions.

The other demands in the plan involve reducing the impact of top-emitting sectors like industry (which contributes 34 per cent of emissions), energy systems (33 per cent) and buildings (20 per cent).

Michelle Wyatt said there are large opportunities ahead and progress has already been made.

"Bendigo has an active and passionate community who care about tackling climate change," she said.

"We are now seeing a substantial shift, as more action is taken at a state and federal level and more and more people recognise the financial benefits of transitioning to renewable energy."

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