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ENVIRONMENT

EU, Germany reach deal on fossil fuel car phaseout plan

The European Union and Germany on Saturday said they had struck a deal after a dispute over the planned phaseout by 2035 of the sale of cars using fossil fuels.

EU, Germany reach deal on fossil fuel car phaseout plan
Frans Timmermans, European Commission vice-president, delivers a speech at the Sharm el-Sheikh International Convention Centre during the COP27 climate conference. Photo: AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP

A landmark deal to prohibit new sales of fossil fuel cars from 2035 is key to the bloc’s ambitious plan to become a “climate-neutral” economy by 2050, with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.

But in an unprecedented move earlier this month, leading car producer Germany blocked the agreement at the last minute after it had already been approved under the traditional EU legislative process.

Berlin demanded that Brussels provide assurances the law would allow the sales of new cars with combustion engines that run on synthetic fuels, the focus of the breakthrough announced on Saturday.

“We have found an agreement with Germany on the future use of efuels in cars,” EU environment commissioner Frans Timmermans said on Twitter.

“We will work now on getting the CO2-standards for cars regulation adopted as soon as possible.”

German Transport Minister Volker Wissing said on Twitter that vehicles with combustion engines could continue to be registered after 2035 if they only use fuels that are neutral in their CO2 emissions.

Weeks-long negotiations between the European Commission and Germany to break the impasse centred on Berlin’s desire for a stronger commitment on synthetic fuels than that presented in the initial text.

The synthetic fuels Germany wanted an exemption for are still under development and produced using low-carbon electricity. The technology is unproven, but German manufacturers hope it will lead to the extended use of combustion engines.

Environmental NGOs have disputed the value of synthetic fuels in the automotive sector’s transition towards clean energy sources, saying they are too expensive, polluting and energy-intensive.

Some industry experts have expressed doubt over whether vehicles powered by synthetic fuels can compete in a market against electric cars that are expected to become cheaper over time.

Audi boss Markus Duesmann told the Der Spiegel weekly that synthetic fuels “will not play an important role in the medium-term future of passenger cars”, even if they prove to be helpful in the green transition.

Domestic politics at play

Some observers saw domestic political calculations behind Germany’s initial move to block the deal, which ruffled the feathers of some of Berlin’s EU partners.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats form a coalition government with the Greens and the liberal FDP party, which initiated the move.

The FDP, which has lost five regional elections in a row, is struggling in national polling and hoped to gain the support of voters hostile to a ban on combustion engines.

Scholz was seen as acting to maintain the unity of the coalition by aligning with the FDP position against the Greens.

Fellow major car manufacturer Italy, Poland and Hungary joined Germany in a small alliance against the combustion engine ban.

The EU aims to reduce CO2 emissions from new vehicles to zero, with the planned combustion engine plan effectively imposing electric vehicles from the middle of the next decade.

The industry has anticipated the new EU rules by massively investing in electric vehicles in recent years.

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ENVIRONMENT

Climate protesters under fire in France, Germany, France and UK: UN expert

Environmental activists are increasingly facing hostility across Europe, a UN expert said, warning that the very right to protest was "at risk" in countries usually considered beacons of democracy.

Climate protesters under fire in France, Germany, France and UK: UN expert

Michel Forst, the UN special rapporteur on environmental defenders, told AFP in an interview this week that he was deeply troubled by the hardening tone against climate activists in countries including France, Austria, Germany and Britain.

Government ministers have been throwing about terms like “eco terrorists” and “Green Talibans” to describe non-violent activists, he claimed, also blaming some media reporting for contributing to an increasingly hostile
public attitude.

“It creates a sort of chilling effect,” warned Forst, an independent expert appointed under the UN’s Aarhus Convention — a legally-binding text that provides for justice in environmental matters.

“Currently, the right to protest is at risk in Europe.”

Forst said he had recently visited several European countries after receiving complaints that activists faced treatment that allegedly violated the convention and international human rights law.

Following a visit to Britain, he publicly voiced alarm at the “toxic discourse” and “increasingly severe crackdown” on environmental defenders.

 ‘Regressive laws’ 

Forst charged that “regressive laws” in Britain were being used to slap climate activists with harsh penalties, with one activist sent to prison for six months for a 30-minute slow march disrupting traffic.

Another activist had been sentenced to 27 months behind bars in the UK, he said.

He also decried harsh sentences in other countries, including Germany.

Forst travelled to France last month following complaints about a crackdown on a drawn-out anti-motorway protest near the southwestern city of Toulouse.

Activists, called “squirrels”, who have been squatting in trees destined to be chopped down to make way for the A69 motorway, have accused law enforcement of denying them access to food and water and using floodlights to deprive them of sleep.

Forst said he had been blocked from bringing food to the activists, and was “shocked” by what he found.

“Obviously, deprivation of food, of drinking water, of sleep is clearly against international law,” said Forst, a French national.

They are “considered acts of torture in international texts”, he added. 

Dangerous

Forst said that European media coverage often focuses exclusively on the drama around demonstrations and not on the climate crisis prompting the protests.

The world is in a very “dangerous time”, he said, but the general public often do not understand why young people are “blocking access to airports, or gluing their hands on the floor”.

As a result, states have felt justified in developing new policies and laws, paving the way for police crackdowns, and increasingly harsh sentences.

In Britain, he said that some judges were even barring environmental defenders from using the word “climate” to explain their motivation to the jury.

Forst said that he was investigating whether big companies, especially in the oil and energy sector, might be lobbying to increase the pressure on climate activists.

“The most dangerous” companies were even “using security forces, connections with the mafia… to target and sometimes to kill defenders,” he said.

Forst said he was currently organising consultations in Latin America and Africa with environmental activists there who are facing attacks by companies.

He is also investigating whether companies based in Europe are, through local subsidiaries, contributing to attacks on activists.

And the expert blasted European countries for “a double standard” by supporting environmental defenders in other parts of the world but “not protecting their defenders inside Europe”.

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