Car manufacturers should be allowed to build cars which emit higher than average CO2 emissions, where the increase in emissions results from the inclusion of legally binding safety measures, according to a report adopted by the European Parliament yesterday.
The report, which represents a considerable softening of the European Commission's ambitious targets for the reduction of vehicle emissions, was prepared by a committee of MEPs chaired by German MEP Jorgo Chatzimarkakis.
Stressing the economic importance of the motor industry - a significant part of which is based in Germany - to the European Union, the report insists no mandatory targets for vehicle emission reductions should be made before 2015.
It also said additional safety systems in cars which are demanded by the EU, such as air bags, Nox filters and metal crumple zones, add considerably to the weight of cars, their fuel consumption and thus their CO2 emissions.
Chatzimarkakis told the Parliament meeting that any new rules should discount these additional emissions. The targets should "allow car manufacturers to emit additional CO2 if these are the result of legally binding measures" he said.
The report also argued targets should be accompanied by an increase in member state funding for research and development in the automotive sector, and suggested that the new European Institute for Innovation and Technology should be asked to address CO2 reduction in vehicles as a primary concern.
As a policy, the report is in conflict with the more ambitious proposals set out by the Commission which wanted to see average emissions reduced by manufacturers to 120g of CO2 per kilometre.
Providing exemptions for some high-emission vehicles, the report is also potentially in conflict with the new Irish regulations which impose uniformly higher taxes for vehicles at the higher end of the emissions scale. But the report has the powerful support of the president of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Pöttering. Speaking to The Irish Times, Pöttering said: "CO2 should not be used to destroy our competitiveness in the field of cars in the EU."
He said questions of how the lower targets might be met, whether there should be an individual cap on the transport emissions generated by each member state, or whether car manufacturers should set average emissions levels across their brands, or indeed some combination of both, were premature.
The report, referred to as Cars 21: a Competitive Automotive Regulatory Framework, also called for "protection of intellectual property rights" to stop copycat designs being produced in the Far East. The committee also said it recognised the influence of motorsport in changing attitudes, and called on the authorities in Formula One racing to change their rules so that environmentally-friendly technologies can be more easily applied.
The Association of European Vehicle Manufacturers also told The Irish Timesthat it wanted to see a global standard agreed for vehicles, including trucks. The association's director of communications Sigrid de Vries, said a limit of 140 grammes of CO2 per kilometre, on average, had been put forward by the association as an average standard for cars.
But she made the point that in Europe the mandatory safety features in vehicles would add weight and increase emissions rates, while cars in less stringent regulatory frameworks would be able to claim lower CO2 emissions.