**3. EU green transition**

The EU's strategy for reducing emissions is based on 3 main pillars: increasing transport efficiency, accelerating the development of low-emission energy alternatives in the field of transport, moving to zero-emission vehicles.

The European Commission implements the green objectives (to reduce CO2 or noxe emissions, at the same time with the use of fossil fuels going through net-zero emissions by 2050) rely on the National Recovery and Resilience Plans to counteract the economic effects of the Covid pandemic, that must be implemented by every European country. EU has imposed one ambitious target to decrease by 55% the CO2 emission up to 2030. This is an intermediate step to achieve zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. To achieve its goal, the European Union combine the European Environment Agreement, with the European Climate Law. In July 2021, the European Commission proposed CO2 emissions reduction of new cars to zero from 2035. The process of implementing the infrastructure needed for electric vehicles will lead the EU to one of the most advanced continents for the delivery of electric vehicles in the coming years. In this respect, the new goal of the International Energy Agency is to deliver the first energy sector roadmap [15].

One of the EU instruments is "Fit for 55" plan. At the same time, a number of proposals can be found in "Fit for 55".

Fit for 55 Plan has the main objective the emission reduction by 55% up to 2030 [16]. The major objective of the EU is to attain climate neutrality up to 2050, as it is stipulated in the European Green Deal, through the European Climate Law as the use instrument. The legislative revision related to this plan arise "Fit for 55 package" [17].

According to **Figure 9**, 31 countries have electrification targets or Internal Combustion Engine bans for cars. The European Union, along with 8 countries have announced zero net emissions commitments.

The main category of vehicles that are supposed to be developed is the light-duty vehicle (LDV). The spread of the light-duty vehicle (LDV) will be twill be the most used road vehicle. Even the trucks category type of road vehicles is reduced (5% of the total), the pollution with CO2 reaches 30% of total emissions. Therefore, the EU takes into account the trucks category as the second road vehicle to downward the emission to zero net in 2050.

*Introductory Chapter: Towards 2050 NZE Pathway - Electric Transportation DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.102324*

**Figure 9.**

*Timeline for bans of ICE for EU and different countries [18].*

The gradual transition to electric vehicles (BEV and PHEV) by 2030 is based on four factors: consumer affection adaptation, governmental policies, the strategy of the traditional original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and corporate companies' participation [18].

The fundamental path to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 is to impose further EV mobility.

It could be noted that the passenger light-duty vehicles (PLDVs) are the most spreader in the transport sector and will increased the penetration of them due to the European measures in both Stated Policies Scenario, and Sustainable Development Scenario [19, 20].

## **4. Electric transport mode: enabling technologies**

There are some barriers to accelerate sales in EV transport. According to the opinion poll, the future EV buyers' concerns are related to autonomy, fuel cost, charging time, charging infrastructure, safety regarding battery technology [21, 22].

The experts estimate that EVs will be cheaper than those on fuel by 2027, cheaper car manufacturers—such as Dacia—have also entered this market, and charging infrastructures could be accelerated through governmental programs and European governments [23, 24].

Data intelligence still must be part of the infrastructure around the EV [24].

The electric vehicle available infrastructure is an important milestone in the EV integration process. At the same time, the standards in the field along with the infrastructure availability take part from the sustainability of the global emissions reduction challenges.

The battery recharging time is a key point in infrastructure implementation.

Challenges to large spread the EV adoption are charger compatibility, charging infrastructure availability, renewable energy, and climate mitigation, network capacity, vehicle costs, charging behavior, sales outlook, charging station financing, and ownership, prices [25].

Many challenges come from reducing the charging time for battery-powered EVs. These include the amount of available power at the charging station, the cable carrying the power from the charging station to the vehicle, and the charging subsystem within the vehicle itself [25].

From the perspective of charging time, there are currently three standardized charging levels: voltage level 1–120 [V] AC with slow charging time (up to 20 h), voltage level 2 of 240 [V] AC with time 8-h charging (this type of charging is used by domestic consumers, and level 3—fast charging in direct current (40 min charging time of a car battery for a light vehicle) Output Voltage: 200–500 V DC for 60 kW charging station output power [26], Output voltage: 300–1000 V DC for the 120 kW charging station output power.

At the laboratory level, by analyzing and implementing the advanced fluid-based cooling system, researchers increased the current capacity of an electric-vehicle charging-station cable by a factor of four of various EV chargers available worldwide. According to this, the maximum current through charging wires is experiment at 2.4 kA. In this way, the charging time is reduced up to 5 min [27–30].

The maritime transport reveals the first full-electric container navy: Yara Birkeland from the Yara International, Norway [31].

The 6.7 MWh Leclanché Marine Rack System (MRS) contains a high-energy lithium-ion battery. MRS ensures optimal temperature control through integrated liquid cooling. The MRS system also contains an integrated fire protection system specially designed and certified for maritime requirements. The container ship has a service speed of approximately 6 knots, with a maximum speed of 13 knots. The sizes of the total electric navy are 80 m long, 15 m wide, with 3120 tons weight. The battery system (6.7 MWh) of the Yara Birkeland, manufactured in Switzerland, Europe, and the battery life is at least 10 years (**Figure 10**).

For commercial purposes, the vertical take-off and landing Sikorsky Autonomous Research Aircraft (SARA), a full electric helicopter based on the Matrix Technology autonomy system, is a reference for new standards in the field and for logistic development (different kinds of services: routes, and helipads as the infrastructure, and air traffic control) (**Figure 11**).

The new type of vehicles will incorporate the new Artificial Intelligence (AI) Technology, taking into account the recent DARPA Programmes: Explainable AI (XAI) [34] 2017–2021, and Lifelong Learning Machines (L2M). The XAI program is considered as the 3rd wave of AI systems [34, 35].

**Figure 10.** *The Norway (Yara Birkeland) first autonomous and total electric container ship [32].* *Introductory Chapter: Towards 2050 NZE Pathway - Electric Transportation DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.102324*

#### **Figure 11.** *Sikorsky autonomous research aircraft (SARA) [33].*

The L2M program has in view to create the new Artificial Intelligence types of architectures and Machine Learning systems being capable to learn continuously during execution tasks, not separated as the actual AI architectures [36, 37].
