Dear Colleagues

I would appreciate it if you could circulate this advertisement for a PhD 
Studentship at the Centre for Transport Research.

Closing Date: 12th March 2010
Further information: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/cops/graduate/phds/44/ 

Transforming the market for alternatively fuelled vehicles through niche 
applications

Supervisors: Dr Jillian Anable and Dr Mark Beecroft, The Centre for Transport 
Research, School of Geosciences

Efforts to achieve a truly sustainable transport system which is less 
dependent on oil are being focused on the potential for advanced propulsion 
technology vehicles (e.g. electric and hybrids) to transform the vehicle 
market. Yet, in 2008 only 16 000 of these vehicles (or 1% of the new car 
market) were sold in the UK, a figure which has been static for a few years. 
At the same time, new market applications such as car clubs, or pay as you 
go car hire services (called “car sharing” in mainland Europe and North 
America), have seen their membership double each year for the past ten years 
in the UK. At 100 000 members, they are still a small part of the transport 
system, but are beginning to offer a credible alternative to individual car 
ownership. The car club market is evolving all the time with new applications 
among public and private sector company car pools (‘the grey fleet’) and 
partnerships between service providers, communities, businesses as well as 
public transport operators. New vehicle technology may itself facilitate a move 
towards new models of ownership through battery sharing and leasing and 
further enhancements in information communication technology (ICT) (such as 
driver assistance and location and communications for fleet management) will 
help to propel the car club concept to the fore.

This studentship will investigate the potential for these new applications to 
become niche markets for alternatively fuelled vehicles. The study will 
evaluate the current and emerging alternative technologies in terms of their 
appropriateness for shared ownership and use. The technological, commercial 
and policy barriers will be identified and a ‘roadmap’ for the potential uptake of 
new technology in niche markets will be developed. This may involve 
investigating the implementation contexts for known successful applications 
through case studies and identifying the potential market segments by 
mapping the early adopters of car clubs and new vehicle technology in terms 
of demographics and geography. Students should have a commitment to 
interdisciplinary research and should have a background in transport, energy 
and/or environment, possibly from a technical, economic or behavioural 
discipline.

Please check NERC's website for eligibility criteria 
http://www.nerc.ac.uk/funding/available/postgrad/eligibility.asp

Formal applications can be completed online: 
http://www.abdn.ac.uk/sras/postgraduate/apply.shtml 

Informal enquiries should be directed to Dr J Anable ([log in to unmask]) by 
email, including a CV.  All general enquiries should be directed to the Graduate 
School Admissions Unit.