Energy transition policy via electric vehicles adoption in the developing world: Tunisia as a case study

In this study we developed a Sustainable Transport index (IST) to evaluate the impact of public policies on the sustainability of a transport system for different regions of a country. We focused on the energy transition policy via vehicular fleet electrification by analyzing the IST levels and their evolution in a country. The IST index was obtained from 89 sustainable transportation indicators representing the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of sustainability.For the Tunisian case study, the transition to electric vehicles (EVs), made by substituting a proportion of conventional vehicles with EVs with proportions ranging from 0% to 50%, showed that 1 % EV increase induced 0.35%-0.45% increase in the IST. This induces-1.15% reduction in air pollution emissions,-1.15% in greenhouse gases emissions,-0.54% reduction in the fuels consumed by private cars, and an increase +0.27% on the electricity demand.Despite the visible impact of EV transition on the IST and related variables for all the Tunisian governorates, no incidence on the social component of the sustainability was obtained.