Queensland LNP axes zero-emission vehicle target for government car fleet

The Queensland Liberal National Party is scrapping a 2026 zero-emissions vehicle (ZEV) target for the state government-owned fleet in favour of an ambition-lite tailpipe emissions plan. 

The move is the latest in a list of actions the Queensland Crisafullli government has taken to march back state progress on renewables and climate, some of which threaten to undermine billions of dollars of investment by creating uncertainty.  

The new plan for QFleet handballs tailpipe emissions planning back to government agencies and will duplicate some of the work happening for the federal National Vehicle Efficiency Standard (NVES).

The state government will keep a list of preferred zero and low emission vehicles and set its own maximum emissions limit for each vehicle segment.

The new goal is a 10 per cent reduction of tailpipe emissions by 2030 across the vehicles used by public servants, while growing the size of that fleet by 9 per cent in the next five years.

The Labor-era target which applied to around 3,600 vehicles and promised an overall reduction of QFleet tailpipe emissions to 26.7 kilotonnes by 2025-26.

It also aimed to increase the number of secondhand electric vehicles available in Queensland. 

The new strategy forecasts tailpipe emissions to fall from 33.19 kilotonnes in June 2024 to 29.86 kilotonnes by 2030. This includes light commercial vehicles which the current government says weren’t included in the previous strategy. 

“We’ve laid out a genuine pathway to reduce tailpipe emissions and better support the hardworking public servants who rely on QFleet to get them to where they need to be,” public works minister Sam O’Conner said in the strategy.

“We’ve laid out a genuine pathway to reduce tailpipe emissions and better support the hardworking public servants who rely on QFleet to get them to where they need to be.”

The strategy document says it was designed as a “direct result of feedback” from frontline public servants.

It includes hybrids and plug-in hybrids, as well as ZEVs, and the updated strategy includes the use of ethanol based fuel — E10 — and encouraging ecodriving, such as not speeding nor using hard braking, as options to reduce emissions. 

Embracing the NVES

The new system will effectively outsource tailpipe emissions to the federal NVES program, which the federal Liberal party threatened to gut during the election campaign earlier this year. 

“This new approach aligns with the Federal Government’s New Vehicle Efficiency Standard (NVES) for light vehicles which aims to reduce emissions from new passenger vehicles by more than 60 per cent by 2030 and roughly halve the emissions of new light commercial vehicles over the same period,” the QFleet Vehicle Emissions Reduction Strategy 2025‒2030 says.

“The NVES will ensure a better choice of new vehicles that are fuel-efficient, low or zero emissions vehicles.”

The NVES originally aimed for tailpipe reductions of 12.2 per cent for passenger cars and 12.4 per cent for light commercial vehicles every year, before 2030. 

The legislated scheme soft-launched in January this year and regulation of actual tailpipe emissions begins from July 1. 

The actual limit on what a vehicle can emit depends on weight, but any emissions above that must be paid for at a starting rate of $100 per gram-per-kilometer over the target.

Not ZEVy-friendly

The Queensland government has begun to dismantle the state’s once-flourishing clean energy sector since being elected in October last year, by introducing huge uncertainty into state planning processes.  

It froze the planning process for four wind projects and then decided to let them continue.

Then it issued strict new planning rules for wind and solar projects, which some have hailed as good for community engagement and others say are rushed and unfairly target renewables while letting mining projects and developments for the  upcoming Olympics off the hook.

And it cancelled the already–approved Moonlight Range wind project by saying without evidence that it was strongly opposed by the local community, a claim the developer disputes.