Car-makers, EU in CO2 face-off

Europe’s car-makers, its parliamentary leaders and its environmental groups will face off this month over tough new CO2 emissions proposals.

The car-makers are arguing that they’re approaching the limits of what’s possible with internal combustion technologies and, while green groups and the EU itself point out that alternative technologies are available, few countries have taken steps to make their adoption easier.

Critically, the German Government, which five years ago set a target of having a million electric vehicles on the roads by 2020, does not offer any incentives to move to the zero local-emission technology. The governments of Norway, the UK and France are the biggest subsidisers of electric-car technology directly to customers.

The car industry’s peak European body, the ACEA, said it had achieved a 34 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions over the last 20 years, but argues the EU is being unrealistic in expecting a similar drop again over half the time frame.

The car-makers have argued that pursuing CO2 reductions with technologies customers aren’t willing to buy is hurting their competitiveness, but the EU is not accepting the argument. It will meet on June 18 to examine which areas need further CO2 cuts and which technologies should be pursued to get there.

Fleet CO2 emissions in Europe are running at 123.4g/km and the EU has set a target of 95g/km by 2020 (realistically 2021 when full model cycles are accounted for).

Last year though the EU voted to pull that down to 68 to 78g/km by 2025, with a further cut planned for 2030 across the housing, transport and agriculture sectors.

The ACEA insists that delivering on the proposed 68-78 gram figure isn’t realistic under current conditions “because the most cost-efficient actions have already been taken, delivering on that aim requires ever greater technical investments to achieve smaller reductions.

“Thanks to billions of euros worth of investment in R&D, Europe’s cars currently meet the highest environmental standards in the world,” the ACEA secretary general, Erik Jonnaert, said.

“Ensuring further reductions in average CO2 emissions will also be dependent on the greater market uptake of alternative powertrains, including electric, hybrid, fuel-cell and natural gas-powered vehicles.”

Electric vehicles, though, have only chipped out 0.3 per cent of the European car market, so most of the CO2 gains have been made with traditional, internal-combustion powertrains.

“Governments across Europe will need to increase their support if we are to see a significant increase in sales, both in terms of helping to build the charging infrastructure necessary and in influencing consumer choices,” he said.

However, the EU and the green groups aren’t buying it. It has commissioned eight studies on the car-makers’ statements that the CO2 push has hurt their competitiveness and forced R&D costs higher.

Where it only did two studies before delivering the 2021 targets, this time around there will be studies on the existing regulations, technology and costs, in-use issues, weight reduction, mileage, competitiveness, embedded emissions and modalities for future regulations.

It has funds available for alternative-powertrain research through two programs: the Horizon 2020 initiative, with 80 billion euros on offer as grants, and the European Commission’s European Fund for Strategic Investment.