Carmakers – taxman must help us cut CO2

A voluntary agreement to cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from new cars is out of date and should be scrapped, according to the European car industry.

Stavros Dimas, the European commissioner for the environment, angered the carmakers this month by announcing that he would propose legislation to reduce CO2 emissions from new EU cars to replace the existing voluntary commitment.

Dimas said his decision followed signs that the car industry will not manage to bring emissions down to 140 grams per kilometre (g/km) by 2008 and 120g/km by 2012, as required by the 1998 agreement.

But Ivan Hodac, secretary-general of the European carmakers’ organisation ACEA, said it was time to rethink the idea of emissions caps for manufacturers. "We should go away from the 140 and 120 targets," he told European Voice.

ACEA would not have signed up to the voluntary agreement, Hodac added, if it had thought the emission reduction targets were not possible, but manufacturers were no longer able to accept the targets as the most appropriate. He said that economic developments, together with slower than expected consumer interest in the cleanest cars, meant that the voluntary agreement was now out of date.

Top of the list of alternatives to g/km targets were tax instruments, Hodac said. ACEA said that tax breaks for the cleanest fuels, or replacing registration tax with a CO2-based charge for vehicles - an idea currently being discussed by ministers - could encourage drivers to shift to environmentally friendly models.

"We have products and we have to create a market for them," said Hodac. "Maybe the authorities should create a framework in which that could happen. Maybe that means taxes."

Taxation would be just one element of the ‘integrated approach’ favoured by ACEA, he said. Responsibility for cutting car CO2 emissions would be shared between everyone involved, from fuel makers to drivers, rather than leaving manufacturers to shoulder the burden.

The integrated approach could mean developing different strategies for different sectors, said Hodac, replacing the single g/km deal agreed by manufacturers.

Hodac pointed out that CARS21, a Commission-led high-level group on the car industry, concluded last year that an integrated approach was the most appropriate way to cut emissions.

T&E, a conservation group specialising in transport issues, said any new measures to reduce CO2 should come on top of the g/km targets and not replace them. "Industry is pleading for the dilution of its own targets by counting credits for what others do," said Aat Peterse of T&E.

"The 140 and 120 gram targets were accepted for good reasons ten years ago. There should be no diluting of that."

A voluntary agreement to cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from new cars is out of date and should be scrapped, according to the European car industry.