Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne bashes latest EU CO2 proposal
A few years back, the European Commission began drafting tough new standards to regulate the amount of CO2 that vehicles sold in member states could emit -- and its been backing off ever since. While French and Italian company's had no problems at all with the proposed regulations of 120 g/km of carbon emissions, the German brands began protesting. Since then, the Commission has moved the proposals down quite a bit in order to appease the masses. One proposal would have the allowable CO2 emissions based on the size of the vehicle, which would help the Germans, with their large, heavy and powerful vehicles, skirt around the toughest standards. Naturally, Fiat Group CEO Sergio Marchionne isn't at all happy about these changes, saying, "This type of nonsense is clearly the result of political pressures that have been hard at work to protect particular participants in the European automotive market. Fiat as a group will not tolerate them and will do everything in its power to protect its economic interests in a manner consistent with the Commission's objective in substantially reducing CO2 emissions." Because of the sliding curve of the latest proposal, makers of small and lightweight vehicles would be held to a higher standard than makers of large vehicles, which somehow seems rather backwards, wouldn't you say?
[Source: Automotive News Europe - sub. req'd]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Karl-Uwe Strunzen 12:45AM (5/22/2008)
If the Germans aren't capable or unwilling to lower their emissions from the lowest overall figures then they should just shove off. This thing about the Germans selling a lot more bigger cars is just a lame excuse. It certainly true that they sell a lot of tractors in Europe, but given their pathetic emissions averages in Europe and the fact that cars like the Polo, Golf, A-class, A3 and so on are sold in far greater numbers, this is just a poor excuse.
(to grasp German small car emissions, just check out the UK VCACARFUELDATA webpages)
There certainly seems to be lack of money spent on marketing, on propaganda, and on buying off the politicians in Bruxelles. If the Germans opt to spend their money on this rather than on lower the emissions of their cars, they should just shove off.
The difference betweeen the Germans and the French, Italians and Japanese is that there is a REAL emissions improvement effort. Cars like the VW Polo Bluemotion are outrageously expensive and the target sales for 2007 was 950 vehicles. In other words these are only marketing gimmicks. The French and Italians have these same emission values, but at real-world prices and production volumes.
Having emissions based on weight is ridiculous. It means going back to square one and effectively is like saying "let's do nothing at all then". This is why no country in Europe currently has car taxation based on weight. Futhermore, Germany is the only country not to have a CO2-based taxation scheme.
http://www.acea.be/images/uploads/files/20080327_ACEA_Tax_Guide_2008_Introduction.pdf
How much did the German car lobbyists have to pay to buy out Verheugen?
http://euobserver.com/9/26123
The target is already being achieved TODAY by the French, Italians and the Japanese. Toyota have just announced that 50% of their new car range in Europe will meet the 140g threshold. The "industry" Verheugen refers to here are the Germans. I hope he at least invites a few of us to his new villa(s)....
http://www.autobloggreen.com/2007/12/08/bmw-daimler-and-porsche-win-worst-eu-lobbying-award/
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joverwimp 2:06AM (5/22/2008)
Weight should not be a factor at all: car engineers should be pushed to reduce the weight of the vehicules, and by consequence improve fuel consumption. (100kg extra in a car increases fuel consumption by about 3%)
While the German car companies currently 'own' the most polluting part of the car market (sports cars, SUV's, executive cars) they should indeed be pushed to improve their situation. It is in this lucrative part of the automotive market that the most can be gained and the largest budgets are available for R&D, especially since these consumers are less likely to feel the extra cost.
BTW, the US proposal to allow cars with a large footprint to pollute more is about as insane & counter-productive.
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Karl-Uwe Strunzen 8:53AM (5/22/2008)
It is indeed already absurd that the already "lean" guys out there have made the greatest reductions
1) because they are already "leaner" and
2) as mentioned above, because of the larger R&D budgets available to the sellers of expensive cars (with far greater margins)
It's time the Germans got off their backsides and did something more useful with their time+energy+money ....
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