Berlin The federal government wants to collect more than seven billion euros per year from the truck toll in the future. This emerges from the draft for an amended Federal Highway Toll Act, which is available to the Handelsblatt. Instead of the previous 8.5 billion euros, more than 15 billion euros per year are to flow into the state treasury from 2024 alone through road user charges.
With the planned regulation, the traffic light coalition is making use of the possibility under European law to add a climate component to the truck toll. “In the future, the truck toll rate will also include a partial rate for costs for traffic-related carbon dioxide emissions in addition to the partial rates for infrastructure costs and external costs for air pollution and noise pollution,” says the draft.
The toll surcharge is 200 euros per tonne of carbon dioxide released, making it the highest value permitted by the EU regulation.
By 2027, the state wants to collect an additional 31 billion euros from freight forwarders, minus the costs, 27 billion remain. In addition, vehicles weighing between 3.5 and 7.5 tons will also be subject to tolls in the future. The approximately two million vehicles in this weight class are expected to contribute around one billion euros to the annual revenue.
The ministry wants to exclude so-called “craftsmen’s vehicles”, which weigh less than 7.5 tons and of which, according to the draft, a million drive on the streets. In the next four years, the federal government wants to book additional income with an “average value” of 7.62 billion euros.
Zero-emission trucks are missing
Ultimately, consumers will probably have to pay the amount, since the freight forwarders want to pass on the additional climate toll to customers, such as retailers. The industry associations have already made corresponding announcements. They therefore expect consumer prices to rise.
In the draft law, however, the Federal Ministry of Transport points out that “the effects on the consumer price level are marginal”. According to information from the Handelsblatt, a short study commissioned by the ministry showed that the transport costs account for only two percent of the product value and the toll itself accounts for less than ten percent of the transport costs. Accordingly, the price increase amounts to “approximately 0.1 percentage points”.
The Ministry of Transport is working on an amendment to the Federal Highway Toll Act.
(Photo: Reuters)
“To be honest, putting the label ‘marginal’ on a volume of EUR 7.62 billion per year reminds me of the much-cited ‘peanuts’,” said Dirk Engelhardt, spokesman for the board of the Federal Association of Road Haulage, Logistics and Disposal (BGL), the Handelsblatt. “It remains to be seen whether commercial and industrial companies will be just as relaxed about the next freight price negotiations when the transport costs for road freight companies have increased by almost a tenth as a result of the virtual doubling of the toll.”
According to the draft law, the forecast toll revenue from the climate toll will increase in the coming years in parallel with the previous toll. This suggests that the ministry itself does not expect hauliers to switch to zero-emission vehicles.
These are exempt from tolls until 2026. However, there are currently almost no vehicles that are powered by a battery or a fuel cell. They are also significantly more expensive than the most modern diesel vehicles.
Accordingly, the forwarding and logistics associations criticized the planned toll increase. In view of the lack of supply, the price does not ensure that investments are made in climate-friendly vehicles, as has been the case up to now. The charging infrastructure for heavy trucks is also missing.
To date, the toll rates per truck have varied according to the respective Euro standard. This ensured that the haulage companies invested in modern vehicles. Switching to the train is not a solution either. “It drives itself to the limit in terms of capacity,” said Engelhardt. “Citizens are thus burdened with 7.62 billion euros per year in addition to the already existing inflation – for nothing.”
In fact, the FDP had put forward this argument with Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing and accordingly pleaded for a climate toll to be introduced in stages. However, Finance Minister Christian Lindner’s argument to organize additional money in view of the debt brake in order to be able to invest in the sometimes ailing infrastructure has recently prevailed.
The money flows into the dilapidated rail network
The additional income from the truck toll should not be invested in the roads – as was usual with tolls in the past – but should benefit 80 percent of the railways. The SPD, Greens and FDP agreed on this at their coalition summit in March in order to rehabilitate parts of the desolate rail network.
In the next four years, 45 billion euros are to flow into the rail network. The gap to be closed is to be decided during the budget deliberations.
There should also be an innovation in terms of data protection: While toll data, which includes vehicle data including journeys, was previously taboo for third parties, the federal government wants to use it at least pseudonymously in the future, “for example for recording the occupancy of truck parking spaces”, as it was announced when a possible use case in the law is called.
In order to expand the current electronic toll system, the nationalized Toll Collect GmbH bills the federal government 59 million euros and running costs of six million euros annually. 332 new positions will be created at the Federal Office for Logistics and Mobility, which will be responsible for roadside inspections. According to the draft, the authority will incur one-off costs of around 33 million and ongoing costs of 31 million euros.
The associations only had 24 hours to comment until Thursday. The draft law is to be passed by the cabinet on May 10, but has not yet been coordinated with the federal states and within the federal government, according to the ministry.
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