Tendering law targets greener transport

The public sector will have to take green criteria into consideration when procuring vehicles and transport services from 2012, under proposals published by the European Commission at the end of last year.

The Commission’s proposals to update the clean and energy-efficient road transport vehicles directive would compel public sector buyers to take into account the social and environmental cost of pollution caused by the vehicle, as well as its financial cost.

In 2006, the Commission was forced to redraft the plans after they were rejected by the European Parliament’s environment committee for being too weak. The new proposal was published on 19 December.

Dirk Sterckx, a Belgian Liberal MEP on Parliament’s transport committee, said that "it was a good thing that we will take this initiative at European level, it will be an incentive".

The procurement directive was one of several proposals that were overshadowed by an intense debate over Commission proposals on reducing carbon dioxide emissions from cars.

On 21 December, the Commission also set out plans to tighten emission standards from trucks and buses. The Commission estimates that these new "Euro VI standards", which are to come into force in 2013, will reduce nitrogen oxides by 80% and particulate matter by 66% compared to the previous Euro V standards.

Jacques Marmy, a spokesman at the International Road Transport Association, which represents operators of coach and truck fleets, said that the proposals broadly represented what the industry had proposed, but that they could have gone further to meet the most ambitious standards in the world in California. "We wanted something stricter because we need to have worldwide harmonisation."

Jos Dings, director of Transport and the Environment, said: "We can agree [with the Commission]", although he suggested that tougher standards could be introduced sooner.

In the short term, debate on transport and the environment is likely to focus on the fuel quality directive, which aims to revise petrol and diesel standards in order to reduce their environmental and health impact.

The public sector will have to take green criteria into consideration when procuring vehicles and transport services from 2012, under proposals published by the European Commission at the end of last year.