Forecasting petrol demand and assessing the impact of selective strategies to reduce fuel consumption

Abstract

The use of fossil fuels in transportation is an important topic as a result of growing concerns over global warming. Automobile petrol demand has been of particular interest to researchers and policy-makers, given that the automobile is a major contributor to the enhanced greenhouse effect. This paper forecasts Australia's automobile petrol demand up to the year 2020 based on the best performing forecasting model selected out of eight models. In order to establish ways to reduce the demand for petrol, and the consequent by-product of reducing the amount of greenhouse gas emissions, we have estimated the impact on CO₂ for several potential policy instruments, using Transportation and Environment Strategy Impact Simulator (an integrated transport, land use and environmental strategy impact simulation programme). We find that a carbon tax of AU$0.50/kg can reduce automobile kilometres by 5.9%, resulting in reduced demand for petrol and a reduction in CO₂ of 1.5%.     

Forecasting automobile petrol demand in Australia: An evaluation of empirical models

Transport fuel consumption and its determinants have received a great deal of attention since the early 1970s. In the literature, different types of modelling methods have been used to estimate petrol demand, each having methodological strengths and weaknesses. This paper is motivated by an ongoing need to review the effectiveness of empirical fuel demand forecasting models, with a focus on theoretical as well as practical considerations in the model-building processes of different model forms. We consider a linear trend model, a quadratic trend model, an exponential trend model, a single exponential smoothing model, Holt’s linear model, Holt–Winters’ model, a partial adjustment model (PAM), and an autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model. More importantly, the study identifies the difference between forecasts and actual observations of petrol demand in order to identify forecasting accuracy. Given the identified best-forecasting model, Australia’s automobile petrol demand from 2007 through to 2020 is presented under the “business-as-usual” scenario.     

Development of a Model for Enhancing Justice in MPA Designation and Zoning and its Application to Taiwan’s South Penghu Marine National Park

Abstract

Multi-purpose marine protected areas (MPAs) are prevalent world-wide as institutional mechanisms deployed in the marine environment to manage multiple uses, conserve resources and protect ecosystems. Yet some people may experience disadvantage following the implementation of new MPAs. One understudied aspect of MPAs is the distribution of advantages and disadvantages and how best to address the “justice” concerns that they raise. This article identifies a framework of principles, methods and tools to address these concerns. It devises a “MPA justice model” and demonstrates its applicability to a Taiwanese case study. In 2014, Taiwan proclaimed its first multiple-purpose MPA, the South Penghu Marine National Park and the case study shows ways that the MPA’s socio-economic sustainability could have been better accomplished. The article focuses on future MPA establishment that incorporates distributional fairness and procedural legitimacy into MPA site designation and zoning design - but might also be adapted to use retrospectively in MPA review processes.     

Assessing financial impact of maritime ergonomics on company level: a case study

The present paper reports a case study examining a conceptual framework for assessing financial impact of occupational maritime ergonomics in a Swedish shipping company. Specifically, the aim was to study the availability and applicability of suggested determinants for operational performance, routines for estimating the effects of ergonomics and the customer’s (sea transport buyer’s) demands for ergonomics management on the case company. The results show that the determinants and subcategories for operational performance in terms of productivity, efficiency and quality are present and applicable, albeit not measured to any large extent. No routines or specific methods for measuring or estimating cost and effects of ergonomics investments, accidents and operational disturbances were found. Further, the results show that the sea transport buyers increasingly express interest for and place demands related to maritime ergonomics, for instance, through compliance of specific standards and guiding principles linked to maritime ergonomics. It is concluded that in order to support and enable managers’ ability to make well-informed decisions and prioritizations, between investments, ergonomic or other, increased knowledge is needed of the financial effects of ergonomics on company core value processes. There is also a need to develop and implement usable tools to simplify these measuring procedures.     

Design and development of a stated choice experiment for interdependent agents: accounting for interactions between buyers and sellers of urban freight services

Stated choice experiments have proven to be a powerful tool in eliciting preferences across a broad range of choice settings. This paper outlines the elements of a group-based experiment designed for interdependent urban freight stakeholders, along with the procedure to administer the questionnaire sequentially. The focus is on the design of a computer-assisted personal survey instrument and the value in disseminating the details of a new approach to design and collect stated choice data for interacting agents. The paper also discusses how to specify a reference alternative, and then how to recruit appropriate real-market or representative decision-making group members to participate in a subsequent phase of the survey, which incorporates the reference alternative and contextual information from an initial phase. The empirical strategy, set out in some detail, provides a new framework within which to understand more fully the role that specific attributes, such as variable user charges, influencing freight distribution chains might play, and who in the supply chain is affected by specific attributes in terms of willingness to pay for the gains in distribution efficiency.

赛车没有怜悯

马来西亚雪邦比赛开始之前的10天，我病了。因为工作太忙没有得到休息,腹泻一直持续到比赛开始。身体极度虚弱，我被送到医疗中心输液，输液完毕，翻身起来就参加比寒。我体力不支，此时教练对我说：赛车没有怜悯，观众只看结果。     

Tollroads are only part of the overall trip: the error of our ways in past willingness to pay studies

With rare exception, actual tollroad traffic in many countries has failed to reproduce forecast traffic levels, regardless of whether the assessment is made after an initial year of operation or as long as 10 years after opening. Pundits have offered many reasons for this divergence, including optimism bias, strategic misrepresentation, the promise to equity investors of early returns on investment, errors in land use forecasts, and specific assumptions underlying the traffic assignment models used to develop traffic forecasts. One such assumption is the selection of a behaviourally meaningful value of travel time savings (VTTS) for use in a generalised cost or generalised time user benefit expression that is the main behavioural feature of the traffic assignment (route choice) model. Numerous empirical studies using stated choice experiments have designed choice sets of alternatives as if users choose a tolled route or a free route under the (implied) assumption that the tolled route is tolled for the entire trip. Reality is often very different, with a high incidence of use of a non-tolled road leading into and connecting out of a tolled link. In this paper we recognise this feature of route choice and redesign the stated choice experiment to account for it. Furthermore, this study is a follow up to a previous study undertaken before a new toll road was in place, and it benefits from real exposure to the new toll road. We find that the VTTS is noticeably reduced, and if the VTTS is a significant contributing influence on errors on traffic forecasts, then the lower estimates make sense behaviourally.     

Towards a theoretical model for behavioural adaptations to changes in the road transport system

A preliminary theoretical model is developed for the mechanism of behavioural adaptations to changes in the road transport system, which describes the process of behavioural change, explains the nature of adaptation phenomenon, and predicts its effects on road safety programmes. It can be used as a basis to organize the body of adaptation research and to explain empirical results.     

街道与赛道

这个月不断在公路与赛道上交替驾车。在城市街道上与赛道上开车不同．我和大多数车手都是一样的意见．在街道上开车很危险．而在赛道上．我们感觉要安全得多。