The European Parliament’s Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) had already adopted, on 11 May 2022, a position on the proposed regulation on CO2 emissions for new cars and vans.
MEPs backed the measures for a rapid green transition. They approved, despite strong opposition, the proposal for reduce emissions from new cars to zero from 2035, only authorizing the sale of electric vehicles from this date.
Among the measures proposed by MEPs are:
- the elimination of the incentive mechanism for zero- and low-emission vehicles (ZLEV)which no longer fulfills its objectives;
- the progressive reduction of the ceiling for eco-innovationin line with the proposed targets (the existing limit of 7 grams of CO2/km should remain unchanged until 2024, before gradually decreasing);
- a European methodology to assess emissions during the full life cycle of cars and vans placed on the EU market, as well as for the fuels and energy consumed by these vehicles.
If the European Parliament has voted to ban the sale of new thermal cars (gasoline, diesel or hybrid) by 2035, it has exempted the luxury automobile industry. The text provides that these vehicles (from 1,000 to 10,000 passenger cars registered per year) benefit from a derogation allowing them to be equipped with a combustion engine until 2036.
However, the device voted by MEPs would prevent the marketing of high-performance hybrid vehicles or vehicles using biofuels. Car manufacturers could no longer sell new thermal cars (including bioethanol, LPG, hybrid, or PHEV) by 2035.