Average CO2 emissions from new cars sold in the European Union increased by 0.4% (4 grams per kilometre) in 2017 to 118.5g per km (compared to 118.1 in 2016), according to final data published by the European Environment Agency (EEA) on Thursday 4 April.
This final data largely confirms the provisional April 2018 figures and shows that, although 118.5 grams per kilometre is below the current legislative objective (130 g/km), this increase means that car manufacturers are moving away from the target to be achieved in 2021 (95 g/km).
On the basis of these figures, the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) reiterated on Friday its urgent call to “national governments and EU policy makers” to ensure that necessary investments are made in Europe for electric vehicle charging structures, something that is sorely lacking.
“It is no coincidence that 2017 marked the first increase in CO2 from cars since records began in 2010, as it was also the first year that petrol overtook diesel in terms of new car sales. Indeed, petrol cars emit more CO2 emissions than equivalent diesel cars”, stated Erik Jonnaert, Secretary General of the ACEA.
Jonnaert added: “Given that sales of diesel cars continued their decline in 2018, all indications unfortunately point to CO2 emissions increasing for a second year running in 2018.
ACEA data underlines the fact that last year only 2% of all new cars registered were electrically-chargeable. By contrast, petrol further expanded its market share by almost 6.5 percentage points, accounting for 56.7% of all new cars sold.
Meeting the 2021 CO2 targets – not to mention the extremely stringent 2025 and 2030 targets that were agreed recently – will require a much stronger uptake of alternatively-powered cars and will need 2.8 million public charging points by 2030 (compared to the 150,000 currently available), ACEA notes. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)