Assessing the Potential of Carpooling for Reducing Vehicle Kilometers Traveled

The national and local strategies implemented to achieve the French Nationally Determined Contribution (a key element of the Paris Agreement) rely heavily on technological improvements to reach carbon neutrality by 2050, which raises the question of whether these technologies can rise to the challenge, and which social changes are needed to make these technologies reach their full potential. One example of this is the use of digital platforms for developing carpooling. We study the maximum potential of two carpooling schemes for local travel. Our results show that a massive adoption of carpooling would be needed to reach targets set by the national and local strategies, even under maximizing assumptions.