EU delays vote on combustion engine ban as Germany hesitates

Sweden, the current holders of the rotating EU presidency, on Friday delayed a vote scheduled for next week among EU government leaders on the bloc's plans to halt the sale of new internal combustion engine cars from 2035. 

The reason for the sudden delay to the move towards electric cars appeared to be hesitancy within Germany's coalition government. One party in the government, the neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP), are calling for an exemption for petrol and diesel cars using synthetic fuels or "e-fuel."

"I decided to postpone the decision on the 2035 car emissions target from [Tuesday, March 7] to a later Council meeting," Daniel Holmberg, the spokesperson for the current Swedish presidency of the COREPER group that prepares the ground for European Council votes among diplomats, said on Twitter. "Coreper will revert to the issue in due time."

Why is the vote being delayed? 

The deal had appeared to be secure late last year, when the various arms of the EU — the Commission, the Council and the European Parliament — agreed on a law they were confident could be passed. 

Since then, the European Parliament has voted in favor of the plans, and the next step on the path would have been a qualified majority approval from the ruling governments around the EU in the European Council. That would have formalized the plans at the EU level.

A qualified majority in a European Council vote requires both the support of at least 15 of 27 member states and of governments representing at least 65% of the EU population.

Other European countries like Italy, Poland and Bulgaria were known to oppose the proposal, and if Germany were added to this list — even if it had abstained in the vote planned for Tuesday — the 65% support hurdle could not be cleared. 

Why is the German vote now not assured? 

The smallest party in Germany's coalition government, the Free Democrats, have in recent weeks been calling for changes to the proposal. 

The pro-business party is hoping for an exemption for new cars that use synthetic fuels or "e-fuels," which are created using captured carbon monoxide or dioxide together with hydrogen obtained from sustainable electricity sources such as wind, solar or nuclear power. 

The fuels are then deemed carbon-neutral because creating them used up other carbon emissions that would otherwise have gone into the atmosphere. 

The FDP argues that this would be a way to allow limited continued combustion engine production with considerably less environmental impact than if they were to use ordinary gasoline or diesel. A compromise deal reached last summer designed to placate the FDP had included a promised additional proposal on how cars and vans running on nominally climate-neutral fuels could still be registered in the EU after 2035.

The EU was not clear on when this proposal might emerge, but now Germany's transport minister, Volker Wissing, is arguing it should be agreed before the broader plan is approved. 

"Germany is within its rights to expect such a proposal to be put forward when such a proposal is promised," Wissing said early on Friday. 

Meanwhile, coalition partners the Greens argue that Germany should stick to the deal it provisionally agreed to late last year. 

Unless the government could reach an internal consensus, it would have been forced to abstain in Tuesday's vote. 

According to German media reports from shortly before the delay, Berlin had been hoping the vote would go ahead, with plans for intensive discussions at a Cabinet meeting this weekend that would have brought all the major players from the three ruling parties together.

msh/nm (AFP, dpa, Reuters)

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