European Council invites Commission to broaden EU ETS to include road transport
Sat 10 March 2007
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The European Council has invited the European Commission to review the EU Emissions Trading Scheme with a view to increasing its transparency and broadening its scope, possibly to include surface transport. Meanwhile the UK Government, in collaboration with business and NGO leaders, has drawn up an agreed manifesto for the EU ETS.
The European Council, the legislative body of the European Union which is comprised of national state ministers, outlined its position in a communication following a meeting held in early March.
Meanwhile, the Environment Secretary, David Miliband, has launched a UK Manifesto on the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, which outlines how leading UK stakeholders - including the Government, business and some NGOs - would like to see the emissions trading scheme develop after 2012. The group sees the development of a successful EU ETS as an important element of a coherent long-term policy framework, both within the EU and globally, and one which will allow industry to play its part in delivering the emissions reductions required to mitigate the impacts of climate change.
The UK Government has already indicated that it sees transport as one of the key sectors that should be considered when assessing whether to expand the EU ETS. Emissions trading, it says, could offer a cost-effective way for transport to reduce its climate change impact. The LowCVP is collaborating with the Energy Institute to mount a one-day conference on 1 May to present and discuss the latest thinking on the potential for introducing a carbon emissions trading system for the road transport sector.
The Defra website says: "Drawing on the work we have already carried out, we will engage with key stakeholders, the European Commission and other EU member states to help develop a robust evidence base on the costs and benefits of including surface transport in CO2 emissions trading at an EU level."
"We will also continue to investigate the desirability of introducing surface transport CO2 emissions trading at a UK level, either as preparation for EU-wide adoption or as a self-standing measure."
The Environmental Audit Committee has also recently commented on the Government's proposals for emissions trading expansion. The cross-party committee of MPs says that proposals to include aviation in the European emission trading scheme should be significantly strengthened.
The Committee also says that it remains unconvinced that road transport should be brought into the scheme.
A section of the recently published report states: "As yet we have not been convinced by the case for the inclusion of surface transport within future phases of the Scheme. The emissions from this sector can more effectively be tackled through other measures, such as motoring taxes, road charging, and mandatory fuel efficiency agreements with car manufacturers. Moreover, in view of the practical difficulties involved, we believe that it is not just less preferable that surface transport is covered by the EU ETS but conceivably quite unlikely that it ever would be. There is a danger, then, in the Government’s mooting it as a possibility, that it may function as a red herring, and confuse or retard debate on other means of reducing emissions from road transport. At the very least, the Government must finally publish some details of its proposal, and show how it might deal with these reservations."
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