Currently reading: EU could reconsider CO2 emissions targets
New report suggests the way CO2 emissions targets are measured could be altered to ease the financial burden on car makers

The European Union could relax the way CO2 emissions targets for car makers are measured if proposals put forward in a new report are adopted.

According to German newspaper Die Welt, EU Industry Commissioner Antonio Tajani and Fiat’s Sergio Marchionne – who is also head of European car industry association ACEA – are to present a report recommending a change in the way measurements are made.

German car makers have long been pushing for more flexibility in the way that the EU measures the progress they are making in cutting CO2 emissions. The brands want factors such as driver behaviour and national infrastructure to be taken into account, rather than simply tailpipe emissions from new cars.

There is also concern among car makers that the stringent targets that are currently in place are pushing up research and development costs and rendering their vehicles less competitive in price against overseas opposition, a factor that is accentuated by the difficult economic climate.

Car manufacturers are supposed to meet an average of 130g/km across their model ranges by 2015, or face financial penalties. A further target of 95g/km by 2020 is expected to be rubber-stamped by the EU in July.

Tajani will present the report in a meeting of the CARS 21 High Level Group, a body of key car industry figures and politicians over which he will preside.

Another likely topic on the meeting’s agenda is overcapacity, a problem that has prompted the likes of Fiat boss Marchionne to call on the EU to offer help in rationalising the industry.


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jdey123 6 June 2012

Global warming and CO2

CO2 has been rising ever since the industrial revolution kicked in (~1760). We have a global temperature record since 1850. So is there any correlation?

http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/to:1932/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1938/to:1981/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1998/trend

Well, prior to the global temperature record starting, the world had experienced 90 years of increasing CO2 emissions, yet for the first 82 (1850 to 1932) years of the temperature record, there was no global warming at all. There have been 2 further significant time periods of no global warming (1938 to 1981 - 43 years) and (1998 to present - 14 years and counting). Climate scientists have offered no consistent explanation for these long periods in which there has been no global warming despite increasing CO2 emissions. For the last 14 years, they've been claiming that it's due to 'natural variability', which when pushed they explain is solar cycles (peak to trough 11 to 13 years), ocean temperature changes known as ENSO events (last months not years) and volcanic events (last major eruption - Mount Pinatubo in 1991). When it's pointed out to them that they said that the CO2 signal would overcome natural variability in the 1990s and that the solar cycle, ENSO events and volcanic eruptions can't have suppressed the CO2 warming rate for 14 years, they go to a fallback position that 14 years isn't statistically significant and that we have to wait 30 years before it can be said that their hypothesis is false. When it's pointed out that we've had previous no global warming periods of 43 and 82 years, they claim that CO2 levels were weaker back then, so natural variability could suppress global warming for these extended periods. Given these massive holes in this nonsense, it's amazing the sheer volume of alarmist propaganda which is financed by the taxpayer to try to persuade us that if we don't go back to year zero by cutting all CO2 emissions in the next few years, the earth is heading for a Venusian hell.

Orangewheels 6 June 2012

It's amazing what can be

It's amazing what can be reconsidered when you're trying to get around a huge recession and the Euro collapsing.

tomy90 6 June 2012

its about time

its about time they changed this ridicious law. It is having a negative effect on the car industry and making companies like Aston Martin make cars like the Aston Martin Cygnet to get around the law. (the law had the potential of bankrupting some small car manufacturers and forcing them into ownership of larger corporations, which is not a good idea considering competition is good for the consumer)

I think taking into account average annual mileage etc is a very good idea but would be challenging to enforce considering the manufacturers would push for them to be in the lower annual mileage categories and is hard to know what category a car would fit if it is all new for instance the 3 series GT when that comes out.

It is not just about CO2 emissions neither considering a Land Rover Discovery is better to the environment than a Toyota Prius, because of the pollution and damage to the environment in the construction of the car because of those batteries.