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The days of the new internal combustion engine are definitely numbered—at least in the European Union. On Thursday the European Council and the European Parliament agreed on provisional rules to heavily reduce passenger vehicle carbon emissions in 2030 before enacting a complete ban on internal combustion engines for new passenger cars and vans in 2035.

"This agreement will pave the way for the modern and competitive automotive industry in the EU. The world is changing, and we must remain at the forefront of innovation. I believe we can take advantage of this technological transition. The envisaged timeline also makes the goals achievable for car manufacturers," said Jozef Síkela, Czech minister of industry and trade. (The Czech Republic currently holds the EU presidency.)

The EU is already home to some of the world's stricter emissions regulations. Under the current regulations, automakers must meet a fleetwide average of 95 g CO ₂ /100 km ; fail to do so and they're fined €95 for each gram of CO ₂ /km over that limit for every vehicle they've sold in a given year. But much tougher limits are on the way as the EU tries to reduce its carbon emissions by 55 percent by 2030 compared to 1990.

Enlarge (credit: Tunvarat Pruksachat )

The past several years have seen a lot of unexpected turbulence in the global energy market. Lockdowns during the early pandemic response caused energy use to plunge in 2020, but carbon emissions soared as the economy rebounded in 2021. Early 2022, however, saw Russia invade Ukraine and attempt to use its energy exports as leverage over European countries, leading to worries about a resurgence in coal use and a corresponding surge in emissions.

As 2022 draws to a close, however, there are many indications that things aren't going to be all that bad. Coal use has risen, but not as much as feared, and the booming renewables market has largely offset its impact on emissions. Meanwhile, Europe has made rapid adjustments to its energy supplies and appears to be in a position to handle this winter's likely energy demands.

Europe has gotten ready

In many parts of Europe, energy use peaks in the winter with the onset of cold weather. A lot of the heating demand, along with some demand for electricity, is met by burning natural gas, and Russia is a major supplier for the continent. With Russia's invasion of Ukraine, European sanctions initiated a series of threats and then curtailments in Russia's delivery of natural gas, ultimately ending with the apparent sabotage of one of the most significant natural gas pipelines.

Enlarge / Bikes, infrastructure, and willingness to use both are all needed for Netherlands-level cycling use. (credit: Scott E Barbour )

Transportation produces about a quarter of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, and passenger vehicles account for over half that figure. As such, nearly every plan for future emissions cuts includes some variant of getting people out of internal-combustion vehicles—typically into electric versions of the same vehicle. But a couple of countries have managed an alternate route to lower emissions: Denmark and the Netherlands both have bicycle-focused transportation that gets many people out of cars entirely.

An international team of researchers decided to look into what factors have enabled these countries to make that shift and what might happen if more countries adopted a similar transportation focus. Two conclusions are clear: It's hard to get reliable data on bicycles, and bicycle-focused transportation could eliminate emissions equivalent to that of a decent-sized industrialized country.

How many bikes are there?

We have very good figures on the use of motor vehicles through government-required licensing and registration data. For bicycles, this is almost never the case, so the researchers had to estimate the number of bicycles present in most countries. To do so, they took figures on the manufacturing, import, and export and combined them in a model with information on how long bicycles typically last before being junked. The data runs up to 2015, so is already a bit out of date, as the pandemic has boosted cycling in many countries, but the countries they are able to make estimates for cover 95 percent of the global GDP.

Enlarge / The two reactors of the Diablo Canyon facility. (credit: Tracey Adams )

On Friday, California Governor Gavin Newsom sent a series of aggressive climate proposals to the state legislature. And, in a separate but related move, his administration is circulating potential legislation that would allow the state's last nuclear power plant to continue operating past its planned shutdown in 2025. The proposed legislation is remarkably complicated despite its seemingly simple goal and is already facing a backlash from environmental groups, yet it has to be passed by the end of the month when the current legislative session expires.

Big goals

California already has one of the most ambitious sets of climate goals among the US states. But Newsom's plan would accelerate the targets already in place. It would set 2045 as the latest date by which the state would reach net carbon neutrality and make that target legally binding. To make that easier, it would boost the 2030 greenhouse gas emissions cuts from 45 percent to 55 percent relative to the 1990 baseline.

As part of that, California will rapidly cut carbon emissions from electrical generation, with 90 percent clean energy in 2035, and 95 percent in 2040. Concurrently, it will put more areas in the state off-limits to oil extraction and start supporting carbon capture and sequestration.

Enlarge / A man walks up the steps of the US Supreme Court. (credit: Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Thursday's Supreme Court decision regarding the use of the Clean Air Act to regulate carbon dioxide emissions from power plants comes down to two specific issues: Should the Supreme Court take the case at all; and did Congress delegate sufficient authority to the EPA for it to implement a specific regulatory scheme first proposed during the Obama administration? But the case was decided against a backdrop of conflict between the court's conservative and liberal justices, and some of that conflict spills into this decision.

We'll tackle each issue below and discuss what this means for US climate policy. But one thing that should be clear is that this is a fairly minimalist decision since it applies only to the EPA's ability to regulate carbon emissions from existing facilities and not to environmental regulations more broadly. While it doesn't leave the EPA with an obvious next step, it leaves avenues for regulating new power plant construction.

Why now?

As described in our immediate coverage , the decision is focused on the Clean Power Plan, a set of EPA rules formulated during the Obama years that immediately faced lawsuits that put it on hold, where it remained until the Trump administration rescinded it. With yet another new administration in place, the EPA is now formulating replacement rules. As such, the EPA saw no reason for the Supreme Court to intervene at this point.

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images)

The numbers are startling.

We know roughly how much more carbon dioxide we can put into the atmosphere before we exceed our climate goals—limiting warming to 1.5° to 2° C above preindustrial temperatures. From that, we can figure out how much more fossil fuel we can burn before we emit that much carbon dioxide. But when you compare those numbers with our known fossil fuel reserves, things get jaw-dropping.

To reach our climate goals, we'll need to leave a third of the oil, half of the natural gas, and nearly all the coal we're aware of sitting in the ground , unused.