trends and future of sustainable development - TransEco

analysis and literature survey form the basis for the research. In addition, the web-based survey forhauliers can be seen as a part of environmental scanning. As a combination of the results gained by thesemethods we form scenarios in interaction with the policy makers in special workshops to give input tothe decision making that shapes the future of energy efficiency and CO 2 emissions. Another reason forthe variety of methods is that there simply isn’t data available to be gathered by using one single method.Even though there is relatively good statistics available for modelling, some important aspects aremissing in the data.In this context, the literature survey has the possibility to give descriptions as well as projections ofdifferent aggregates and key ratios in the framework. Currently there are especially UK based studiesavailable, where the framework has been utilised in order to make projections considering the future(e.g. Piecyk 2010, already discussed in Chapter 3). Methods implemented in these studies have variedfrom statistical methods to expert methods, such as Delphi. Because of the differences betweencountries, the results of these studies are only limitedly exploitable in other countries. From theperspective of methods, usually the same ones can be applied, which give the researchers thepossibilities to learn from each other as well as to do comparisons where applicable. For the statisticalmethods the limitations of the available and good-quality data may restrict making comparable studiesin different countries.The shorter timeframe, in this case five years, can be seen as projection of the past development, asthe changes occurring tend to be limited – especially compared to the timeframe of 20 years. Thereforethe statistical methods and modelling, especially trend extrapolation, can be seen suitable for making abase forecast for the next five years. For Finland, there is comparable statistics (Goods transport by roadstatistics, GTRS) available since 1995 and with the help of this data we can calculate the key ratios in theframework. Since the rule of thumb is that there should be at least two times more historical data thanthe extrapolated period is (May 1996), we can utilise extrapolation for the time period of five years, butnot fairly for a much longer period. By making extrapolations we assume that the same forces that haveinfluenced the aggregates and key ratios in the framework will continue to have the same effects theyhave had, or at least that for some reason the outcome, the trends, would be the same as before.In Table 1 we present the data sources and the calculations used in the statistical modelling. Thetrend extrapolation is made based on the trends in the key ratios. This approach and the results forFinland are discussed in more detail in Liimatainen and Pöllänen (2010).442