C40 Good Practice Guides: Paris - Autolib

Summary

Through a partnership between the city and the Bolloré industrial group, Paris provides a car share service that offers a convenient and cost-effective alternative for residents facing increased congestion and costs of car ownership. The car share programme consisting of all-electric vehicles also provides a pathway to overcoming market barriers for electric vehicles by getting potential consumers more comfortable with using EVs.

Results

Autolib consists of over 2,500 electric vehicles, 4,710 charging stations, and has attracted over 6.6 million trips and 178,000 individual subscribers. These milestones have in turn resulted in the reduction of 7,575 tons of CO₂ from 2011 to 2014.

Reasons for success

By transforming the relationship between people and cars, and making transportation a more communal activity, the Autolib programme has paved the way to decreasing the economic and environmental burden of personal transport. At roughly 20,000 persons per square kilometre, Paris is one of the densest cities in the world – four times the density of London.^xxii Problems of pollution associated with high vehicular usage in a dense city made an electric vehicle driven Autolib programme an ideal solution to alleviate these concerns, while providing better transportation outcomes for users. In addition, the Autolib programme has proved that EVs are highly suitable for use in this type of urban setting.

When/why a city might adopt an approach like this

The Paris Autolib programme provides a notable blueprint for how obstacles to urban LEV uptake can be overcome through partnerships with other providers. Cities who face limited EV use due to pricing and congestion may find the Autolib project a good example of how partnerships can lead to new relationships between city residents and cars. 

C40 Good Practice Guides

C40's Good Practice Guides offer mayors and urban policymakers roadmaps for tackling climate change, reducing climate risk and encouraging sustainable urban development. With 100 case studies taken from cities of every size, geography and stage of development around the world, the Good Practice Guides provide tangible examples of climate solutions that other cities can learn from. 

The Low Emission Vehicles Good Practice Guide is available for download here.  The full collection of C40 Good Practice Guides is available for download here.

All references can be found in the full guide.