Simulation and Modeling of Vehicle Emissions – A Review

The effect of vehicle emissions is seen as a serious issue for both human and environmental perspectives, which must be urgently addressed. There is huge interest in evaluating the actual level of emissions across Europe and around the World as the number of traffic increases globally. Moreover, energy consumption from the transport sector in many developing countries has not been given the same attention as that of developed countries. Many simulation modelling packages have been utilized to estimate and evaluate vehicle emissions, some of these only achieved based on accuracy or mobility; others considered cost-effectiveness as the main factor. In this paper, an overall review of the most common emission modelling techniques is presented. The work focuses on classifying the methods into three categories: Accuracy (in terms of emission factors), Mobility (small and portable devices) and Cost-effectiveness of each project. Individual parameters such as worldwide usability of the simulation tool and visibility of applying the tool on small area or segment were also addressed and compared with different packages. The challenges in this review paper are to be considered by future researchers as a primary database in vehicle emission modelling techniques for further work in this field.