On Thursday 20 December, the European Environment Ministers reached a political agreement (a general approach) with the Environment Council on the proposal for a European regulation from last May which, for the first time, will impose performance standards on new heavy-duty vehicles to reduce their CO2emissions.
This is a victory for the climate and the future of European innovation. The Austrian Minister for Sustainability, Elisabeth Köstinger, outgoing President of the Council, was applauded for announcing an agreement that won two successful compromise attempts during the session.
The general approach on this proposal for the 'third clean mobility package' was adopted by a qualified majority. Germany abstained.
Reduction targets. The ministers came out in favour of a binding emissions reduction of 15% by 2025 compared to 2019 and 30% by 2030, also binding "unless it is decided otherwise when the Regulation is revised in 2022," the Council points out (the Presidency's initial compromise was less ambitious, as it stated that the 30% reduction would only be binding if it were confirmed during the revision). The revision clause specifies that it will be possible to introduce binding targets for 2035 and 2040.
Penalties. If the targets are not met, the financial penalties for manufacturers will be €4,000 per gram of overrun per kilometre from 2025 to 2029, and €6,800 from 2030 onwards.
For incentives to sell low-emission or zero-emission vehicles, the compromise maintains the supercredit system from 2021 to 2025, but, to accommodate the more ambitious delegations (France, Sweden and the Netherlands), the possibility for a mandatory quota for the sale of these clean vehicles is planned for consideration for the 2025-2030 period when the Regulation is revised in 2022.
Scope of application. Buses and coaches will be added to the list of vehicles that will not be covered due to lack of sufficient data on technological possibilities, but it will be necessary to reassess whether they will be reintroduced in 2022.
"This regulation will save 54 million tonnes of CO2 between 2020 and 2030! This is equivalent to the total annual emissions of a country like Sweden ", said the outgoing President of the Council. His tenacity and the goodwill of the Member States have paid off.
The agreed upon text is more ambitious than the Commission's proposal, which provided for an indicative 2030 target (see EUROPE 12022), but less ambitious than the European Parliament, both for the targets (it advocates -20% for 2025 and -35% in 2030) and the incentives (see EUROPE 12120).
Agreement welcomed by NGOs. The NGO Transport & Environment welcomed this agreement as an "important step" towards the very first emission standards for heavy-duty vehicles. It welcomes the fact that supercredits will eventually disappear. But it underlines that the ministers' ambition is still far from the effort required to enable the EU to achieve its climate objectives by 2030. This agreement came just two days after the agreement on emission reductions for new passenger cars and light trucks. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)