International System Dynamics Conference Reykjavik, Iceland, Aug 6" -10"", 2018
Transition to Alternative Fuel Vehicles
A Distributive Justice Perspective
Wissam EL Hachem, Pietro De Giovanni, ESSEC Business School, France
Re-Conceptualization of the transportation sector is currently underway. The ‘Transition’ of the
transportation system from its current Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) dominated state to an
AFV dominated one is propelled by endogenous emergent behavior, the latter catalyzed by
disruptive innovation such as the 2008 Tesla Roadster sports car. This innovation is fueled by a
decrease in the ICE energy return on investment (EROI) coupled with an increase of AFV EROI.
The transition to a more sustainable transportation system is a complex and dynamic process
(Zhang et al., 2011; Struben&Sterman, 2008), and like any major technological development, it is
path dependent rendering the transitional dynamics crucial to any realistic investigation of the
feasibility and effectiveness of suggested policies.
The literature focuses on the environmental and economic impacts (Boussauw&Vanoutrive,
2017; Harrison, 2013; Martens et al., 2012) arising from our current unsustainable consumption
of fossil fuels. In this paper, we adopt a new and necessary angle when investigating the transition
to AFV that is distributive justice. We define distributive justice following Martens et al. (2012)
as fair access to transportation and justify its relevance following Walzer (1983) by considering
access to transportation as a vital need for people to actualize their full capabilities in society.
As seen in (Boussauw and Vanoutrive, 2017), current sustainable transportation policies result in
paradoxical outcomes. This is due to the tradeoffs between ecological sustainability and
distributive justice. The former implies an upper limit of consumption with maximum policy
efficiency, while the later implies a lower limit of consumption with maximum policy equity.
Policy makers are interested in defining feasible objectives and achieving them in the quickest
and smoothest way possible. Tradeoffs are a prime example of unintended consequences (or
paradoxes) that act as friction when moving the system from its initial to its desired state. Such
tradeoffs are the result of the unavoidable structural complexity of the system. To counteract
such tradeoffs, we can increase the operational complexity by focusing on the interactions
between the system’s components and increasing their coordination.
By considering this extra dimension of distributive justice, we are not only offering a more
wholesome and sustainable assessment of the AFV transition, we are as well tackling policy
tradeoffs by explaining and reducing some of the noted transportation policy paradoxes in
(Boussauw&Vanoutrive, 2017). Our addition of distributive justice as a novel policy objective
increases the operational complexity of the system and consequently creates another layer of
tradeoffs between the components themselves of distributive justice (Hulle et al., 2017;
Colquitt&Rodell, 2015): Equity, Equality and Need. However, this extra layer of tradeoffs proves
to be relatively small and the system as a whole benefits as seen by an overall reduction in the
International System Dynamics Conference Reykjavik, Iceland, Aug 6" -10"", 2018
intensity of the tradeoffs (i.e. reduction in dysfunctional complexity) and a more swift transition
to AFV’s. Our results confirm that we need to consider simultaneously the environmental
objective to catalyze the AFV transition while incorporating distributive justice as a social
objective to constrain the transitional dynamics (from our current ICE dominated state to the
desired AFV state) to remain within socially acceptable boundaries avoiding repercussions which
are avoidable in a non-zero sum system.
Such a transition entails deep changes to a large socio-technical system that is non-linear (i.e.
learning...), plagued with long delays (infrastructure installation, production capacity buildup,
consumer awareness...) and intertwined in a web of feedback loops (supply/demand/prices of
vehicles...). Such a system is consequently prone to “lock-in” the current dominant ICE technology
(Struben&Sterman, 2008) by counter-balancing AFV policies. For the reasons aforementioned,
this paper relies on the System Dynamics (SD) simulation methodology to capture the most
important feedback loops at play in such a transition while keeping track of the possible tradeoffs
to offer insights into policy design that benefit from synergies between the different components
of the system and minimize the tradeoffs.
Our SD model focuses on light to mid duty vehicles in the private transportation sector. It
investigates the impact that technological development of the AFV’s coupled with marketing
efforts and policy interventions will have on their market share in the future while measuring the
novel distributive justice objective. Each of the three components of distributive justice (Equity,
Equality and Need) are given an operationalized definition within our specific AFV transition
context.
References
1- Boussauw, K., Vanoutrive, T. 2017. Transport policy in Belgium: Translating sustainability
discourses into unsustainable outcomes. Transport Policy, 53: 11-19.
2- Colquitt JA, Conlon DE, Wesson MJ, Porter CO, Ng KY. 2001. Justice at the millennium: a meta-
analytic review of 25 years of organizational justice research. Journal of Applied Psychology
86 (3), 425.
3- Hulle, S., Liebig, S., May, M. 2017. Measuring Attitudes Toward Distributive Justice: The Basic
Social Justice Orientations Scale. Social Indicators Research, 136(2): 663-692.
4- Harrison, G., Shepherd, S. 2013. An interdisciplinary study to explore impacts from policies
for the introduction of low carbon vehicles. Journal of Transportation Planning and
Technology, 37(1): 98-117.
5- Martens, K., Golub, A., Robinson, G. 2012. A Justice-Theoretic approach to the distribution of
transportation benefits: Implications for transportation planning practice in the United
States. Transportation Research A, 46: 684-695.
Struben, J., Sterman, J. 2008. Transition challenges for alternative fuel vehicles and
transportation systems. Environmental and Planning B: Planning and Design, 35: 1070-1097.
Walzer, M., 1983. Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality. Basic Books.
Zhang, T., Gensler, S., Garcia, R. 2011. A study of the diffusion of alternative fuel vehicles: an
agent-based modeling approach. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 28: 152-68.
p
ew
