Brussels In the battle for the internal combustion engine, the decisive round has begun. In the next few weeks, the EU wants to agree on emission values for cars. So far, the draft says: In 2035, no more carbon dioxide (CO2) will come out of the exhaust of a new vehicle. The car manufacturers can then save on the exhaust altogether, because every car with a combustion engine emits CO2 – even if it is operated with e-fuels.
The conservatives in the European Parliament want to change that. They want to delete the target value for 2035 and create the possibility for e-fuels to be included in the carbon footprint of car manufacturers. This emerges from the amendment by their transport policy spokesman, the CDU MEP Jens Gieseke. “Why shouldn’t we keep all options open?” asks Gieseke.
He coordinated his request with MPs from other countries. The conservative party family EPP wants to proceed as united as possible in order to break the trend towards ever stricter limit values. Greens and Social Democrats want to speed up the exit from the combustion engine. The Liberals disagree.
Many drivers would like to drive with e-fuels. In a Forsa survey, 60 percent of those surveyed said they would rather use climate-neutral fuels than electricity to protect the climate.
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The big advantage of e-fuels: the range is long and refueling is quick. E-fuels promise a future in which drivers can keep their habits and still be climate-neutral on the road.
E-fuels are produced from hydrogen and CO2, for example. When e-fuels are burned, only this CO2 is released again. The bottom line is that a car can be climate-neutral if the e-fuels were previously produced with clean electricity.
However, the planned law does not allow this. Gieseke wants to change it so that it will only be decided in six years whether and when emissions will be reduced to zero.
Industry fears for hundreds of thousands of jobs
Above all, fuel manufacturers should sell climate-neutral e-fuels and receive credits for doing so. The car manufacturers are supposed to buy these credits and be able to calculate themselves as cleanly as possible.
A similar system already exists today: car manufacturers whose fleets do not meet the limit values can cooperate with other manufacturers and thus avoid fines. The Commission wants to abolish that.
Because she sees no realistic chance of protecting the climate through e-fuels. Their production is too complex and consumes too much electricity. They should therefore only be used where they cannot be replaced – above all in airplanes and ships, perhaps also in trucks. Expanding the capacities to such an extent that cars can also be supplied would be immensely expensive.
On the other hand: The conversion to electric drives is also a huge industrial conversion. Many automotive suppliers will have to reinvent themselves or are on the brink of collapse. Engine blocks, transmissions and many other parts are simply no longer needed. The industry itself expects 501,000 jobs to be lost across Europe and only 226,000 new jobs.
>> Read here: E-fuels instead of mass layoffs: Suppliers propose changes to the Green Deal.
Gieseke therefore warns against too much pressure: “If we ensure a good transition, the transformation can succeed without being disruptive.”
He sees e-fuels unfairly slowed down. Because the production of car batteries also consumes a lot of energy. “We have to consider the entire life cycle of cars, not just the exhaust gases,” argues Gieseke. However, the Commission does not provide any methodology for this, although it has been commissioned to do so since 2019.
The pillars should be there in front of the cars
From the driver’s point of view, another point is particularly important in the debate: they are concerned that they will not be able to find a charging station when they need one.
The EU therefore wants to step up the pace and dictate that the member states set up new pillars quickly. There is a proposal from the EU Commission, now it’s about the details. However, the responsible parliamentarian Ismail Ertug (SPD) is concerned that the expansion is going too slowly.
So far, it has been planned that one kilowatt (kW) of charging capacity must be installed for each electric car. If the fleet of almost 50 million cars in Germany is eventually completely replaced by electric cars, there would have to be 50 million kW of installed charging capacity in the country, which could be achieved with two million 25 kW systems or with correspondingly fewer but more powerful systems . So far there are a good 52,000 charging points in Germany with around 1.7 million kW.
Ertug is considering increasing the requirement significantly, to around three kilowatts per electric car, while the electric car fleet is still small. The more it grows, the lower the target can drop, the Social Democrat proposes.
That sounds illogical at first: For a particularly small number of electric cars at the beginning, there should be a particularly large number of charging stations? But it makes sense. Otherwise, the car buyers will wait for the charging stations and the energy suppliers will wait for the cars. Ertug says: “If the electric car market is not taking off in some countries, it may be because there are not enough charging options. So we have to build pillars faster than cars are sold.”
Germany will find it easier than other countries to meet the EU requirements. Compared to southern and eastern European countries, significantly more has already been invested.
But what happens if a member state does not meet the requirements? Ertug is considering a fine of 1,000 euros per year for every kW of charging power that is not installed. Just as car manufacturers have to pay if they do not meet their fleet targets, countries should also pay if they do not meet the charging targets.
However, the member states must also agree to the law. It will be difficult to find a majority for sanctions among them.
More on this: The revolution in the gas network: hydrogen for the home – the EU is preparing an admixture.