Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-12-03-Speech-3-177"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20031203.14.3-177"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
".
Mr President, I would like to thank the rapporteur, Mrs Lucas, for her thorough, well-drafted report on the Commission’s ship emission strategy.
Reducing ship emissions of air pollutants and greenhouse gases is a priority for the Commission, since we know that if measures are not taken, by 2020, ships in European Union seas will emit more air pollutants than all land-based sources combined. I therefore welcome most of the proposals in the Parliament’s draft resolution and I am pleased to say that the Commission is already working to take these forward.
For example, on market-based instruments, we are examining a range of possible options. We held a useful stakeholder workshop in September 2003 to which parliamentarians were invited.
On the issue of taking international ship emissions and EU national emission ceilings into account, we aim to launch a study soon to get a better perspective on how significant ship emissions are in individual Member States compared to land-based emissions. On the use of shoreside electricity and abatement technologies for air pollutants, we aim to use the same study to examine the costs and benefits and present positive examples. We shall feed the results of this work into the Clean Air for Europe Programme in 2005, and present proposals as appropriate.
The question of ship sulphur is of course subject to codecision negotiations on the Commission’s marine fuel sulphur proposal. The proposal as drafted would deliver a significant 40% reduction in sulphur dioxide emissions targeted in asset-sensitive northern Europe.
The Council’s progress on the proposal has been slower than we would have liked, but we have used the extra time to investigate the costs and benefits of the tighter sulphur limits proposed by the European Parliament in June 2003. In response more specifically to Mrs Lucas’ points, we share her concern about the slow progress in Council and we now hope that a common position will be agreed upon under the Irish presidency early in 2004.
We have found that the 0.5% fuel sulphur limit proposed by the European Parliament would give rise to a price premium of approximately EUR 70 on every tonne of fuel. The environmental and human health benefits of the tighter sulphur limit would still outweigh the costs but the overall cost to the shipping industry would double to over EUR 2 billion. We must consider whether this is proportionate, bearing in mind the Commission’s commitment to promoting a modal shift from road to sea transport.
Lastly, in direct response to a question raised by Mrs Lucas on the issue of ship greenhouse gas emissions, I am pleased to inform her that the International Maritime Organisation is due to adopt a strategy on this issue later this week."@en1
|
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples