EU: MEPs vote on the "climate package" to turn the page on the heat engine
A traffic jam (photo illustration).
"Eliminating 100% of heat engines is illusory," said the conservative group European People's Party (EPP).
Pixabay/CC0
Text by: RFI Follow
2 mins
MEPs vote today Wednesday the climate package "Fit for 55" and look into the end of the heat engine for cars and vans.
The text provides that 100% of new vehicles sold from 2035 be equipped with an electric motor, i.e. zero CO2 emissions from the exhaust.
The Conservatives are against it and have tabled an amendment to lower this threshold to 90%.
Measurement is in any case essential to the climate plan.
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With our special correspondent in Strasbourg,
Juliette Gheerbrant
"
Eliminating 100% of heat engines is illusory
," said the conservative group European People's Party (EPP), which advocates a smoother transition, as Les Républicains (LR) MP Geoffroy Didier explains: "
90%, that's remains very ambitious.
But the fact of preserving, if only 10%, that is to say a share that is certainly symbolic, but still exists for hybrid cars beyond 2035 is part of the political lucidity that we must show .
We must adopt a principle which is that of reality.
And in fact, in the history of the industry, 2035, 15 years, is almost overnight
.”
“
The competitors will not wait for us
”
For ecologists, on the contrary, in thirteen years the public authorities can do a lot to help the industry, and it is even urgent, explains Karima Delli of the Greens group: "
If we don't turn the corner now, the competitors won't won't wait for us
."
The industrial shift continues the MP, it is to relocate, train and innovate: “
There will be the policy of the circular economy.
Third thing is that we have to innovate and that's good, we have the best innovators in France, for example since we have retrofits.
What is a retrofit: you change the engine and put in an electric motor.
That also requires training and new careers
.”
100,000 jobs lost
This is all the more urgent since in France, for example, the automotive industry lost 100,000 jobs between 2008 and 2011. To help manufacturers cushion the transition, the text provides that manufacturers will be able to continue to export thermal vehicles, outside the European Union.
►Also read: “
Dieselgate
”: the car manufacturer Fiat-Chrysler pleads guilty and pays 300 million dollars
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