Brussels, 03/04/2014 (Agence Europe) - European legislation on CO2 emission permits for the aviation sector will only cover intra-European flights until 2017. After this date, however, it will apply to all flights to and from EU destinations. This is effectively the main thrust of the compromise ratified on Thursday 3 April by the European Parliament.
This non-application of the “aviation carbon tax” to intercontinental flights represents an important concession by the EU to third countries such as China, the United States, Russia and India. The Council will therefore have to adopt the text before the end of the month because the current system expires at the end of April.
The EP's environment committee narrowly rejected the informal agreement between the EU institutions to extend the derogation to Directive 2008/101/EC on the European Trading Scheme (ETS), which intercontinental flights currently benefit from (EUROPE 11042), until the end of 2016.
During the plenary vote on the report by Peter Liese (EPP, Germany), the EP/Council compromise was ratified by a large majority (458 votes for, 120 against and 24 abstentions).
Liese stated that “the key element for us concerns the scope. The Emissions Trading System will again apply in full after 2016. Parliament could not accept the Council's wish to 'stop the clock' until 2020. We have the next International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) assembly in 2016, and if it fails to deliver a global agreement, then nobody could justify our maintaining such an exemption for another four years.”. He said that he was “delighted” that the compromise had been adopted and was convinced that the EP had not given in to the Council. The rapporteur explained that at the end of 2016, the “stop the clock” system will end. Strict criteria have been defined for an international agreement: CO2 emissions need to be reduced and there should not be any discrimination.
Member states are also obliged to provide information on how they spend the income generated from the emissions trading system. They think it should be used to tackle climate change and fund research, particularly in low emission forms of transport and aeronautics. This transparency is a key factor for supporting the EU's international commitments, affirmed MEPs.
Gilles Pargneaux (S&D, France) asserted that, “the rejection of this proposal at the plenary session would have convinced third countries that they could leave the negotiating table by denouncing the unilateralism of the EU. A no vote would have effectively jeopardised the conclusion of an ambitious international agreements on climate at the 21st United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP 21) in Paris in 2015. We were unable to take these risks” (our translation). (LC)