Brussels, 09/07/2014 (Agence Europe) - European Commissioner for Transport Siim Kallas has set the tone for the approach to be followed for creating an alternative fuel recharging infrastructure in Europe. He is particularly keen on creating the necessary infrastructure for gas stations for ships and heavy goods vehicles.
Kallas expressed his views at an event organised by the Natural and Bio Gas Vehicle Association on Tuesday 8 July. He underlined the importance of applying the recently adopted directive on clean fuels as quickly as possible. The first targets to be met by member states include compressed natural gas infrastructure for urban transport by 2020 and liquefied natural gas for heavy goods vehicles and in ports by 2025. The commissioner stated that, “although the dates are not completely ideal, I think the timeframe agreed is still reasonable and provides the necessary reliability for planning purposes. It is the signal the industry was expecting in order to move forward”. He said that the priority now had to be put on stimulating private investment in the new market and, in this, industry would have to play a vital role.
He believes that using gas in road and maritime transport deserves more attention as a means of reducing energy dependency in Europe and replace oil. Nonetheless, he points out that ships find it particularly difficult to access liquefied natural gas (LNG). He also said that “Europe urgently needs more LNG fuelling stations” and indicated that the new directive intended to make this fuel available for ships in the main maritime and inland waterway ports and for heavy goods vehicles on motorways. (MD)