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DRIVING

Do I need a Spanish emissions sticker to drive my foreign car in Spain?

With the introduction of Spain's new 'low-emission zones' in towns and cities this year, many foreigners and tourists might be wondering if they need a Spanish emissions sticker to drive their foreign-registered car on the roads here.

Do I need a Spanish emissions sticker to drive my foreign car in Spain?
Though you won't have to buy a Spanish emissions sticker you'll likely have to register your car and pay to use the ZBEs, perhaps on a daily basis. Photo: Pixabay.

As part of the Spanish government’s climate change and energy transition legislation, a series of low-emission zones (Zonas de Bajas Emisiones, ZBE) were introduced across the country from January 1st 2023.

In order to help enforce these new ZBEs, the Spanish government are rolling out emissions stickers to identify which type of car you have, its emission status, and to help fine those drivers who disregard the new rules of the road.

You can find out more information about the different types of stickers and how they will affect drivers, which The Local covered here.

READ ALSO: GUIDE: How to get an emissions sticker for your car in Spain 

Understandably, as so many millions of people visit Spain on holiday every year, many are wondering how all this will affect them especially if they drive in Spain in a foreign registered car.

Do I have to buy a Spanish emissions sticker for my internationally registered car?

No, well at least not the emissions-specific stickers Spanish drivers will use, anyway. But you may have to purchase something depending on where you are from and where you are going, as we explain below. 

In fact, the DGT do not even release or allow Spanish emissions stickers on foreign cars.

READ ALSO: The new road signs drivers in Spain need to know in 2023

So what do I have to do?
 
As these low-emissions zones are newly established and many areas aren’t even enforcing them yet, it isn’t clear yet how exactly cars with international license plates will have to identify themselves in the new ZBEs. There are a handful of European countries (see below) that have equivalent emissions stickers that can be used in Spain, but most don’t.
 
And as these ZBEs will be so localised, that is, town and city halls will have a certain degree of autonomy with regards to the rules because there are nationally binding regulations, it is likely that the rules on foreign cars will be on a city by city basis.
 
We can, however, use Madrid and Barcelona as examples that might give us a better idea of how it’ll probably work.
 
 
The short answer is: though you won’t have to buy a Spanish emissions sticker (like Spaniards will be required to have), you’ll likely have to register your car and pay to use the ZBEs, perhaps on a daily basis.
 
If we take Barcelona, for example, according to the ZBE registration and authorisation page foreign cars wanting to drive in the ZBEs must be registered. Of course, some internationally registered cars will meet the environmental requirements and can obtain long-term permits to be able to drive anywhere in Barcelona whenever they want. These vehicles are generally:
 
  • Motorcycles and mopeds (category L) classified as Euro 2 or higher (usually registered after 2003).

  • Passenger cars (M1) classified as electric, Euro 3 gasoline (usually registered after 2000) or higher or Euro 4 diesel or higher (usually registered after 2005).

  • Trucks (N2, N3), buses and coaches (M2, M3): electric, diesel Euro 4 or higher (usually registered after 2005).

Others however, especially older cars, won’t meet those requirements and have to apply for day permits, and can use up to 10 one-day authorisations throughout the year.

You can find all the information you need about registering, applying and paying for the day permits here.

Registration is €5 and it’s €2 per extra day authorisation, so we can use those figures as a ball-park estimate for what other ZBE passes around Spain might be.

You can find information on registering your car in the Madrid ZBE here.

Though most areas are still finalising the details of their ZBEs, it’s likely other cities will use similar systems and you’ll have to register you car and pay for some kind of daily permit to use the low-emission zones.

What happens if I don’t?

If you drive into a ZBE without authorisation (and are caught), you’ll be fined €200. This is the flat-rate fine for Spaniards and foreigners, established in Spain’s Traffic Law reforms back in March 2022.

What if I live in a country with its own vehicle emissions categories?

If you live in a country like France and already have an equivalent sticker then you won’t have to buy a Spanish emissions sticker. In fact, you likely won’t have to pay anything at all, depending on your car.

There are several other countries in Europe that have their own system of environmental car stickers. These are Germany, Austria, Denmark, and France.

If you have a car registered in one of these countries and want to drive in Spain, specifically in one of the newly established ZBEs, or in certain parts of Madrid and Barcelona, where they’ve been established for some time, you’ll be able to drive with the sticker from your own country but will need to understand what they entitle you to do and where they entitle you to go.

What their equivalent in Spain would be, in other words, as this could potentially affect where you’re allowed to drive.

Fortunately, the DGT does have some guidance on this, which you can find here.

Petrol cars

According to the DGT website, if you have a petrol car or small van the sticker equivalencies are as follows.

Equivalent emissions stickers for petrol cars and small vans. Photo: Dirección General de Tráfico

Diesel cars

If you have a diesel car or small van:

Equivalent emissions stickers for diesel cars and small vans. Photo: Dirección General de Tráfico

Motorbikes and other two-wheel vehicles

Equivalent emissions stickers motorbikes and other two-wheel vehicles. Photo: Dirección General de Tráfico
 
Alternative energy vehicles 
 

Equivalent emissions stickers for alternative energy vehicles. Photo: Dirección General de Tráfico
 
Low-emissions zones
 
The new rules apply to municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, which number 149 across the Spanish territory, and authorities in municipalities with more than 20,000 inhabitants and high air pollution levels will also have to introduce the new measures.

It is worth noting, however, that despite the new rules officially being introduced to start 2023, they are not being actively enforced yet. In fact, many cities have already suggested that it could take some time, such as Zaragoza, which has said it will take months to begin applying it, and Valencia, where the deadline to finalise the rules and fines has been vaguely defined as sometime “in the course of 2023.”

The only places implanting the rules (and fines) to start of 2023 are Madrid, Barcelona, Pontevedra, in Galicia, and Zaragoza.

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TRAVEL NEWS

Are France’s loss-making regional airports under threat?

Just a quarter of France's airports break even financially with the rest - the smaller, regional airports - heavily subsidised by the state. But can this situation continue?

Are France's loss-making regional airports under threat?

France last year welcomed 199 million airline passengers – bringing the country numbers back to almost pre-pandemic levels. 

But it was only a handful of French airports that took in the vast majority of those millions – with Paris’ Roissy-Charles de Gaulle (CDG) and Orly airports responsible for more than half of the air traffic.

France’s Cour de Comptes counted 73 mainland commercial airports in their 2023 review of the airline sector – but only 15 of those actually break even, the rest rely on subsidies.

Some of these airports are exceedingly small, like Troyes which had just 1,562 passengers in 2023. Others, like Rodez with 31,577 passengers and Castres with 36,454 got a bit more.

Map of airports in France, including both passenger and non-passenger airports (Credit: l’UNION DES AÉROPORTS FRANÇAIS & FRANCOPHONES ASSOCIÉS – UAF & FA)

Limoges was larger, with 264,426 passengers in 2023, but it still paled in comparison to the 10.8 million that passed through the Marseille airport.

The cost of small-to-medium sized airports

The former head of the Air Transport Institute, Jacques Pavaux, authored a 2019 study on public aid to airports, finding that those with less than one million passengers per year are not profitable, noting that only 15 of France’s airports get enough traffic to be profitable.

As for the others, most have been loss-making for years, unable to continue services without significant aid from the state.

“Their chronic deficit has been filled by recurring operating subsidies granted over decades of existence. Almost half of them have never had, and will never have, any chance of reaching the traffic threshold guaranteeing financial balance,” Pavaux wrote. 

The study found that state and local authorities spend around €90 million every year to help keep the small-to-medium sized airports afloat. 

Of the 73 airports listed in the Cour de Comptes report, a little over half (38) counted fewer than 700,000 passengers a year. 

The Cour de Comptes called these “the most economically fragile”, noting that they depend on aid from local authorities to balance operations and carry out the necessary investments.

On top of that, many do not have negotiation options and find themselves competing with neighbouring airports, leaving them forced to take on contracts with low-cost airlines. 

As of 2021, low-cost air traffic represented more than 90 percent of commercial traffic for airports in Dôle, Vatry, Limoges, Bergerac, Nîmes, while it constituted all of the traffic at the Carcassonne, Tours and Béziers airports.

Over-density of airports

Some areas stand out for having a particularly high volume of commercial passenger airports, like Occitanie along the Mediterranean coast in southern France, which is home to nine.

The Cour de Comptes report found that in Occitanie 71.5 percent of regional airport traffic occurred at the Toulouse airport, followed by Montpellier with 14.4 percent.

The other seven – Carcassone, Tarbes, Perpignan, Nîmes, Béziers, Rodez and Castres – combined provided the remaining 14 percent of traffic. 

Valérie Renet, the head of the Occitanie Regional Chamber of Accounts, told France 3 that it is this ‘over-density’ that leads to financial losses, as “operating deficits are covered by public subsidies, that is to say that taxpayers’ money is used to balance the operation of these airports, usually for the benefit of low-cost companies.”

Last year, the airport of Bézers, which is “totally dependent on Ryanair”, received €5.1 million in public money to reach equilibrium, which equates to about €20.69 paid out per passenger, France Bleu reported. 

As for Ryanair, the company benefits from over €30 million in public subsidies – or €16 per passenger – from regional airports in Occitanie alone.

The picture is similar in Brittany, which is home to eight airports, though over 80 percent of traffic is concentrated in Brest, which has a little over one million passengers a year (as of 2018).

The future for small-to-medium sized airports

Building new airports has already become controversial – a proposal for a new airport at Notre-Dame-des-Landes near the city of Nantes was the subject of huge protests for years until in 2018 the project was officially abandoned.

But that doesn’t mean that the loss-making existing airports are under threat. 

In terms of what to do with the loss-making airports, Renet focused on the situation in Occitanie. She told France 3 that she was “not advocating for getting rid of the airports. They serve other needs specific to the region, not just commercial flights.”

For example, the Nîmes airport is a national hub for air rescue and civil protection operations, meanwhile ‘pelicandromes’ which are used to fight forest fires, are installed at the Béziers, Carcassone and Perpignan airports. 

Instead, Renet and the Cours de Comptes advocated for streamlining the management of airports to a regional, rather than local level. This would help to avoid overlapping flights – like a Pau-Paris and a Tarbes-Paris that take off around the same time.

The situation may also change in 2027, when the European Commission is due to examine public aid given to airports and whether large subsidies given to airports constitutes unfair competition.

There are also climate concerns, as France moves to invest more train transport to reduce carbon emissions. In 2021, the country passed a law banning domestic air links of less than two hours and 30 minutes when an alternative train option exists.

However, this law has so far only banned three routes: Orly-Bordeaux, Orly-Lyon, and Orly-Nantes.

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