A preliminary study to evaluate emissions factors by real and micro simulated driving cycle

Transport activities contribute significantly to the air pollution and its impact on emissions is a key element in the evaluation of any transport policy or plan. Calculation of emissions has therefore gained institutional importance in the European Community. To obtain emission factors several methods make use of only vehicle mean velocity, which can be easily obtained by vehicle flow and density in the road. Recently in ARTEMIS project by Rapone et al. (2005–2007) a meso scale emission model, named KEM (Kinematic Emission Model), able to calculate emission factor has been developed. This model is based on a new statistical methodology, capable to consider more attributes than the simple mean speed to characterize driving behaviour. An interesting approach to determine the exact mix of driving cycles is represented by the use of microscopic traffic simulation models that could be used to avoid the very expensive costs of experimental campaigns needed to obtain real driving cycle. For such a reason this preliminary study aims at testing the capabilities of four well known car-following models at reproducing real life trajectories and then at checking the errors introduced by using the simulated trajectories, in the place of the real ones, for calculating traffic emissions by means of the KEM emission model.