energies Article The Impact of Fleet Electrification on Carbon Emissions: A Case Study from Poland Krzysztof Zamasz 1,2 , Jakub St ˛ echly 1,3 , Aleksandra Komorowska 4 and Przemyslaw Kaszy ´ nski 4, *   Citation: Zamasz, K.; St ˛ echly, J.; Komorowska, A.; Kaszy ´ nski, P. The Impact of Fleet Electrification on Carbon Emissions: A Case Study from Poland. Energies 2021, 14, 6595. https://doi.org/10.3390/en14206595 Academic Editor: Grzegorz Karo ´ n Received: 14 September 2021 Accepted: 11 October 2021 Published: 13 October 2021 Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affil- iations. Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/). 1 Department of Management, WSB University, Cieplaka 1c, 41-300 D ˛ abrowa Górnicza, Poland; kzamasz@wsb.edu.pl (K.Z.); jakub.stechly@gmail.com (J.S.) 2 Veolia Energia Warszawa S.A., S. Batorego 2, 02-591 Warsaw, Poland 3 Energy Contracting Poland Sp. z o.o., Pulawska 2, 02-566 Warsaw, Poland 4 Mineral and Energy Economy Research Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences, 31-261 Kraków, Poland; komorowska@min-pan.krakow.pl * Correspondence: kaszynski@min-pan.krakow.pl Abstract: Fleet electrification is one of the measures proposed for achieving climate neutrality in the coming years. The replacement of internal combustion engine vehicles with electric vehicles has a positive impact on carbon emission reduction in some countries. However, in countries highly dependent on fossil fuels, such a possibility requires examination with respect to the means of electricity generation and fuel mix used in their power systems. One such country is Poland, selected as an example of an economy strongly dependent on fossil fuels. The main objective of this paper is to investigate the impact of fleet electrification of an individual company located in Poland on the reduction of carbon emissions. The concept and calculations are based on historical data on the single-year mileage and fuel consumption of 619 cars used by this company. Even though the Polish power system is based on fossil fuels, fleet electrification could contribute to a reduction in carbon emissions of 24%. The decrease in operational costs by EUR 370 thousand/year is also significant. Apart from environmental and economic impacts, this paper provides valuable findings on the difference between catalogue and real-driving data application in the various analyses. With respect to Polish fuel mix in 2019, the application of data published by car producers shows that fleet electrification would increase carbon emissions by 14% in this company. This means that depending on the initial assumptions, different conclusions can be drawn by policymakers, regulatory bodies, academics, or other groups of interest. Keywords: electromobility; electric vehicle; carbon emissions; fleet electrification; sustainable mobil- ity; sustainable development; fleet management; energy mix 1. Introduction Electrification of transport is one of the key pathways towards energy transition [1]. Electromobility is also indicated as one of the solutions to achieving carbon neutrality in the European Union by 2050 [2]. However, the real impact of the electrification of transport on carbon emissions reduction is strongly dependent on the fuel mix of a given power system. Consequently, in countries where electricity is still mainly produced in coal-fired power plants, the impact of electrification is difficult to assess. In the year 2019 in Poland, the total installed capacity in the power system was 46.8 GW, out of which, coal or gas-fired generation units stood for 74.3% (23.2 GW of hard coal-fired power plants, 8.4 GW of lignite-fired power plants, and 2.8 GW of natural gas-fired units). Electricity produced in these power plants amounted to 131.8 TWh (83.0% of total electricity production in 2019), of which 78.2 TWh was produced in hard coal-fired power plants, 41.5 TWh in lignite-fired power plants, and 12.1 TWh in natural gas-fired units [3]. The structure of electricity production in 2019 is shown in Figure 1. Additionally, because of Energies 2021, 14, 6595. https://doi.org/10.3390/en14206595 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/energies