Reducing harmful emissions from trucks and buses is the objective of a draft package, which the European Commission intends to bring forward by the end of 2007. Before finalising this so-called "Euro VI" proposal, the Commission is now inviting stakeholders to comment on the future limit values, for emissions such as particulate matters or nitrogen oxides (NOx). The Commission proposal will significantly contribute to a further improvement of air quality in Europe. The Commission will take into account the feedback received in the consultation when drafting the final proposal.
Commission Vice-President Gnter Verheugen, responsible for enterprise and industry, said: "This is good for the health of our citizens and the environment. Industry gets a clear perspective and the time to prepare to produce clean, high quality vehicles without endangering its competitiveness. This is another example of our forward looking approach to reconcile the vehicle industry and the environment. It is now up to stakeholders to have their say."
Although air quality has improved over the past decade, there are still significant air quality problems throughout the European Union, especially in urban areas and in densely populated regions. Member States and their citizens are concerned about the risks to human health and the environment that result from such air pollution.
In that context, the draft Euro VI proposal will lay down common EU rules on the construction of motor vehicles with regard mainly to their emissions of ozone precursors (nitrogen oxides NOx and hydrocarbons HC) and particulate matter (PM).
Stakeholders are requested to give their views on a number of scenarios with different levels of stringency. In order to converge to uniform limit values in different parts of the world, two of the scenarios are similar to the future US standards. Stakeholders are also requested to comment on the influence of the different scenarios on fuel consumption and CO2.
The consultation can be found here
Interested stakeholders are invited to email their comments by 5 September 2007 to the following address: entr-emissions-euro-VI@ec.europa.eu
Bron : Europese Commissie