The need for fuel-efficient and less polluting transportation was in focus at the second Middle East Automotive Summit held as part of the second international edition of the Qatar Motor Show yesterday.“Every litre of gasoline saved can eliminate 2.3kg of CO2 from the atmosphere,” Qatar Automotive Gateway (QatarAg) CEO Ahmed M Sorour said at the summit which had the theme ‘The New Age of Mobility.’Speaking on ‘Lightweight materials in the automotive industry,’ he emphasised that the benefits are fuel efficiency and improved emissions, payload efficiency, performance improvement and maintenance cost reduction. “A reduction of 1kg in vehicle weight will result in a 20kg reduction of CO2 emissions over the lifetime of the vehicle,” he said, while explaining that the three levels of vehicle emission reduction are fuel consumption, fuel carbon content and vehicle activity.Aluminium offers up to 40% weight savings potential whereas carbon composites offer up to 60% weight savings potential.Volkswagen official Harald Ludanek, who spoke about ‘Future trends in automotive technologies,’ stressed that environmental protection and sustainability of vehicles and production process are becoming more important for success, next to performance and driving characteristics. “About 23% of the fuel consumption depends on the car’s weight,” observed the head of vehicle engineering and prototyping in technical development area.New materials and adapted construction principle must be developed in order to reduce the weight of cars. These materials must be of high quality, sustainable, durable and functional for the service life of the vehicles.“There will be various different drive technologies in the near future and the main types are efficient internal combustion engine, plug in powertrain and battery electric vehicles,” Ludanek said. The challenges in the future are material development, energy storage, light weight construction, clean combustion engine and connected mobility with networked cars, he added.In a presentation on ’10 megatrends shaping the automotive industry’s next decades,’ Automotive News Europe editor-in-chief Harald Hamprecht pointed out that a new breed of low cost cars, like the ones brought out by Tata or Dacia, answer the demand for basic transportation.“They are reliable, cheap and easy to repair while offering fuel economy, safety, comfort and options,” he said.Observing that the global population is estimated to be 9.2 billion by 2050, Hamprecht said the number of vehicles are expected to reach 3bn by then, compared to the 700mn now. Another challenge, noted Luigi Piero Ippolito, Product Strategic Scenario & Innovation, Magneti Marelli, was the continuous neglect of the actual stakeholder in the equation: humans.“It’s easy to imagine, even considering a big growth of the current technology level, that human behaviour will be part of the solution,” noted Ippolito.V G Ramakrishnan, senior director of Automotive and Transportation for the region, Frost & Sullivan, then shared his vision of the future where commuting is multi-modal and rests on integration. “The developing markets are likely to be at the forefront… and they are integrating public transportation; rail network, electric cycles, bicycles, two-wheelers and more. For a consumer, convenience, fuel economy and environment will remain the ultimate choices,” said Ramakrishnan.Roberto Vavassori, vice president SGL/Brembo and director, Business Development, Brembo, highlighted how technology transfer from aviation and aerospace to open-road vehicles has been a beneficial one.“The transfer of technology has enabled a better lifetime of brake discs, shortened the production process and improved overall performance,” said Vavassori, brakes from whose company can be found in 17 out of 20 best braking cars