MEPs have sent a signal that Europe should fight back against attempts to reduce its efforts to combat emissions from air transport. The European Parliament’s environment committee has voted to support the Commission’s proposal that all carbon dioxide that aircraft emit in European airspace should be subject to emissions trading, and not simply emissions from intra-EU flights. T&E joined forces with the group of low-fares airlines to support the Commission’s proposal.
Limiting the requirements for emissions permits to intra-EU flights also discriminates against short-haul airlines, as most of their flights are subject to emissions trading while the more polluting long-haul flights that start or finish outside the EU are exempt. This led to an unlikely alliance of T&E and the European Low Fares Airline Association, which held a joint news conference last month calling on MEPs to support the Commission’s proposal.
The association’s secretary-general John Hanlon said: ‘To prolong the one-year-only “stop the clock” as the basis of the ETS is not only discriminatory but environmentally ineffective, as it captures only 20% of EU aviation emissions of CO2 while letting long-haul flights off the hook.’
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