A closer look at Europe's latest annual emissions figures reveals some reasons for concern. In the first of a two-part blog, T&E's Director Jos Dings explains the reality behind the EEA's numbers.
Opinion by Jos Dings - T&E Director
Did we miss something? Last year, the European Commission didn’t propose a single new legislative measure to clean up transport. To be fair, it has been spending most of its time worrying about the future of the Eurozone. As a result, for T&E this was the sort of year where seeds for smarter transport policy were sown. We’re optimistic that next year could bring a decent crop of positive changes.
The gulf between the transport sector’s increased greenhouse gas emissions and cuts from other sectors grew again in 2008. And aviation and shipping’s share of transport emissions rose from 18% in 2007 to 24% in 2008. These are two findings from T&E’s latest report on transport emissions.
Annual data compiled by the EEA and submitted to the UNFCCC on the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions usually leave out emissions from international shipping and aviation (so-called “bunkers”).
To complement the 2008 data, T&E wrote an analysis which includes shipping and aviation figures and aims at clarifying the actual contribution of the transport sector to the EU’s CO2 emissions.
Proceedings from the April 2004 seminar on economic instruments, hosted in Brussels by T&E.