Introducing Behavioral Change in Transportation into Energy/Economy/Environment Models

Transportation is vital to economic and
social development, but at the same time generates undesired
consequences on local, regional, and global scales. One of
the largest challenges is the mitigation of energy-related
carbon dioxide emissions, to which this sector already
contributes one-quarter globally and one-third in the United
States. Technology measures are the prerequisite for
drastically mitigating energy use and all emission species,
but they are not sufficient. The resulting need for
complementing technology measures with behavioral change
policies contrasts sharply with the analyses carried out by
virtually all energy / economy / environment (E3) models,
given their focus on pure technology-based solutions. This
paper addresses the challenges for E3 models to simulate
behavioral changes in transportation. A survey of 13 major
models concludes that especially hybrid energy models would
already be capable of simulating some behavioral change
policies, most notably the imposition of the full marginal
societal costs of transportation. Another survey of major
macroscopic transportation models finds that key
specifications required for simulating behavioral change
have already been implemented and tested, albeit not
necessarily on a global scale. When integrating these key
features into E3 models, a wide range of technology and
behavioral change policies could be analyzed.