The European Parliament voted on Wednesday 28 October in favour of more ambitious national caps on emissions of six key pollutants, including nitrogen oxides, particulates and sulphur dioxide. Air pollution causes about 400,000 premature deaths in the EU annually, and the plans could save up to €40 billion in air pollution costs by 2030, said lead MEP Julie Girling.
However, the measures did not go far enough for some environmental campaigners, such as the European Environmental Bureau (EEB), which described the new directive as “timid”, with exemptions on methane emissions for farmers agreed upon as part of the deal.
MEPs approved the proposed caps for sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, non-methane volatile organic compounds, methane, ammonia, and fine particulates, to be achieved by 2020 and 2030, as proposed by the Commission. MEPs will now enter into negotiations with the Council of Ministers with a view to reaching a first-reading agreement.
Before the vote, Copa and Cogeca lobbied MEPs hard and were accused by the EEB of blackmail, because of a warning that if emissions caps were too restrictive, farming would become prohibitively expensive and food production would shift out of the EU.
Following the vote, Copa and Cogeca secretary-general Pekka Pesonen said the directive overall especially in relation to methane, one of the main pollutants from farming, but expressed concerns about ammonia reduction targets.
“We need to ensure fair burden sharing between member states in a cost-efficient way, which is lacking in the current EU Commission proposal,” said Pesonen. “Moreover, the proposal does not take sufficiently into account previous efforts made at national level by industry to tackle emissions. We have reduced ammonia emissions by almost 30% from 1990,” he explained.
“As it stands now, the Commission proposal will drastically accelerate changes in the structure of farms because the ammonia reductions are not cost-efficient and this was not highlighted in the Commission’s impact assessment. Small and medium-sized farms will be particularly hard hit. This is not good for the environment because if our production is cut, demand in Europe and in the world will be met from non-EU countries, which have less stringent environmental legislation than us. And of course it is not good for the economy and society as a whole. We think there is room for good sense to prevail concerning this question and we look forward to contributing in that direction in the upcoming talks with EU Council,” Pesonen said.
The text approved by the Parliament will now go into three-way negotiations with the European Commission and Ministers for the Environment so that a final deal can be hammered out in the new year.