BRUSSELS - The European Union approved stricter clean-air rules for oil companies such as Total SA and BP Plc to supplement new emission curbs on cars and a campaign to boost the use of biofuels.
The EU decided to force the petroleum industry to reduce by 6 percent, over the fuel lifecycle, emissions of gases blamed for global warming by the end of 2020 compared with 2010. The bloc also allowed a greater amount of environmentally friendly ethanol to be used in gasoline and tightened limits on fuel pollutants such as sulfur.
The objective is “ensuring respect for minimum levels of environmental protection,” says the law, endorsed on Monday in Luxembourg by the EU’s 27 national governments. After the European Parliament gave its backing in December, the governments’ approval ends a legislative process that began two years ago and clears the way for publication of the law.
The EU is stepping up the fight against air pollution to counter the risk of environmental catastrophes from global warming and reduce premature deaths from smog. The bloc is lowering caps on factory and power-plant emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, and tightening limits on tailpipe pollutants including nitrogen oxide.
Energy is the root cause of most air pollution and of climate change, accounting for four-fifths of greenhouse-gas emissions in the EU. The bloc aims to cut greenhouse gases by a fifth in 2020 compared with 1990.
‘Very ambitious’
The new law compels makers of fuel for vehicles to monitor and report greenhouse-gas emissions during the fuel lifecycle including production and use starting in 2011. The related 6 percent emissions-reduction requirement by end-2020 is less than an original proposal by EU regulators for a 10 percent cut.
“The 6 percent target is still very ambitious,” said Isabelle Muller, secretary general of the European Petroleum Industry Association representing companies including Total, BP and Royal Dutch Shell Plc. “Our concern is that we get the right biofuels in the right quantities.”
The target can be reached through the use of biofuels -- made from crops such as rapeseed, corn and sugar -- any other alternative fuels and reductions in flaring and venting at production sites. A planned 2012 review could lead to an extra 2 percent cut obtained through CO2 storage underground and electric vehicles and to a further 2 percent reduction obtained through the purchase of United Nations-backed credits covering flaring and venting reductions in the developing world.
Gasoline blend
To allow more biofuels in gasoline, the law creates a gasoline blend with a higher permissible oxygenate content, including up to 10 percent ethanol, no later than 2011 compared with 5 percent at present. To protect consumers, it also enables the marketing of the existing gasoline specification with the maximum 5 percent ethanol until 2013.
This complements an EU law requiring at least 10 percent of energy for road and rail transport to come from renewable sources led by biofuels. Both pieces of legislation are part of package that also includes laws curbing CO2 from cars starting in 2012, tightening CO2 caps on factories and power plants in the European emissions-trading system as of 2013 and requiring EU nations to limit greenhouse gases from industries outside the trading system by 2020.
While the fuel-quality legislation was proposed a year earlier than the other laws, all were approved in December by the EU Parliament after a negotiated agreement with national governments. The governments endorsed the whole package on Monday.
The new fuel-quality law also lowers the sulfur content in gas oil for non-road machines such as farm tractors to 10 parts per million from 1,000ppm and for inland-waterway vessels to 10ppm from 1,000ppm by 2011.
The legislation pares the maximum polyaromatic hydrocarbon content in diesel to 8 percent no later than end-2010 from 11 percent and affirms a lowering this year of the limit on sulfur in diesel to 10ppm from 50ppm.
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