Combustion engine phase-out + New Zealan • Table.Briefings

Dear reader,

Charles Michel chose big words: He was convinced, the Council President said during his Europe speech in Berlin, that the EU could become “the great power of peace of the 21st century“. However, this power is notoriously difficult in dealing with less peaceful neighbors such as the Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko. Michel himself is spontaneously traveling to Poland on Wednesday to discuss solutions to the refugee drama on the border with Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. “Polish and Baltic borders are European borders,” he stressed.

Despite all the demonstrative optimism for the European project, some things are also going too slowly for Michel. For example, the free trade agreements: “The EU is good at concluding agreements but less good at ratifying them.” Michel sees two starting points here: “We should take inspiration from the more transparent and inclusive method of the Brexit negotiations.” And not to overload the agreements.

One should not believe that one can “solve all the world’s problems at once”. The investment agreement with China, for example, which is on hold, will not transform the People’s Republic into a democracy. But it does create a platform for discussing human rights with Beijing.

Less critical: the agreement with New Zealand. In mid-November, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants to announce an agreement on the free trade agreement between the EU and the island state. But New Zealand’s economic importance for the EU is minor. As Silke Wettach reports, the deal has more symbolic value – especially given the tensions with Australia.

From New Zealand to Glasgow: Since yesterday, Germany has been one of the 29 supporters of the joint declaration to phase out international financing for fossil fuels. This now also involves turning away from oil and gas financing. Germany had been hesitant and had drawn a lot of criticism for it.

And the Federal Republic of Germany is not exactly one of the driving forces in another area either: At today’s transport day of COP26, host Great Britain wants to present an agreement on the Global combustion car phase-out from 2040 present. Germany is holding back, although the declaration would be compatible with the EU’s Green Deal plans. Timo Landenberger and Lukas Scheid have the details.

Your
Sarah Schaefer

COP26: controversy over global combustion engine phase-out

By

Timo Landenberger

A possible date for the global phase-out of the internal combustion engine is becoming the central question on the transport day of the UN climate conference in Glasgow. Today, host Great Britain wants to present an agreement according to which only new cars that no longer emit any pollutants are to be registered worldwide from the year 2040. In leading industrial nations, the zero-emissions limit is to be introduced five years earlier.

However, the agreement has lost some of its explosive power even before its official announcement, as several leading car manufacturers and nations are not among the signatories. As reported by the Financial Times, Germany has so far held back alongside the US and China. In addition, Volkswagen and BMW announced that they would not support the agreement.

This raises questions. After all, the declaration would be perfectly compatible with the EU’s Green Deal plans. The adjustment of CO2 limits for passenger cars as part of the Fit for 55 package envisages a 100 percent reduction in emissions by the year 2035, which would de facto be tantamount to phasing out the internal combustion engine. The BMU says that it has not yet been finally decided whether Germany will sign the agreement. In this respect, it is not possible to comment in more detail at the moment. “We will read the text line by line, word by word, and then decide,” said BMU State Secretary Jochen Flasbarth when asked by Europe.Table.

For Stef Cornelis of the environmental organization Transport and Environment, the German government’s reluctance is incomprehensible. “Germany is once again putting the brakes on climate protection,” says the director of T&E’s Berlin office. The phasing out of the internal combustion engine by 2035 in industrialized countries is absolutely realistic and can also be achieved globally by 2040, he said. The technological possibilities are there, and we just have to start the transformation fast enough.

Volkswagen, the world’s second-largest automaker, sees things differently. The speed of the transformation will vary from region to region, “depending, among other things, on local political decisions that drive investment in electric vehicles and infrastructure,” a VW spokeswoman told Europe.Table. In addition, an accelerated shift to electric mobility would have to be in line with an energy transition towards 100 percent renewables. The group has therefore decided not to sign the declaration.

Greenpeace files suit against VW

According to Martin Kaiser and Roland Hipp, Volkswagen will no longer be allowed to sell combustion engines after 2030. The two Greenpeace directors have therefore filed a lawsuit against the carmaker at Braunschweig Regional Court. This was announced by the environmental organization on Tuesday. Kaiser and Hipp base their demand on calculations by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) on the so-called global greenhouse gas budget.

If VW were to sell more internal combustion vehicles after 2030, which would be on the road for an average of 17 years, the company would drastically exceed the budget to which it is entitled, according to the statement of grounds for the lawsuit. The environmental associations Greenpeace and Deutsche Umwelthilfe had already announced at the beginning of September that they would take German car manufacturers to court for insufficient climate protection measures. BMW was one of the addressees.

In addition to Volkswagen, however, the Bavarian group also announced that it would not sign the agreement on the global phase-out of the internal combustion engine, “as there are still considerable uncertainties regarding the development of the global infrastructure,” according to a BMW spokesman. To that end, there are major differences between markets. With Lukas Scheid

A symbolic deal

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen already has one date firmly in mind: On November 18th, she wants to announce an agreement in principle on the free trade agreement between the EU and New Zealand together with Jacinda Ardern. The New Zealand Prime Minister is expected to stop by Brussels on her way back from the climate conference in Glasgow.

For von der Leyen the deal would have great symbolic value – and not just because it would be convenient for her to have a photo with the popular Ardern. In Brussels, the free trade agreement is also seen as an opportunity to punish Australia. The country’s decision to join the Aukus security alliance with the US and Britain without informing Europeans first has angered many in Europe. France’s President Emmanuel Macron felt snubbed by the cancellation of the multi-billion dollar order for submarines. The EU has also been negotiating a free trade agreement with Australia since 2018, but a deal is not yet in sight.

According to reports, Macron has already assured the New Zealand prime minister of his agreement to the trade deal. However, he backed down from his promise when he took note of the points negotiated so far, according to Brussels.

This is because the deal is likely to provide relief for the import of New Zealand agricultural products in particular. The government in Paris indicated at the end of October that France wanted to put all negotiations on free trade agreements on hold before the presidential elections in May 2022. Macron wants to avoid giving his rival, who is critical of free trade, ammunition from the far left and right in the election campaign.

French farmers traditionally reject the opening of markets for agricultural products from third countries and, in the case of New Zealand, fear competition for dairy products. The deal with the South American Mercosur countries Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay, in particular, is also viewed very critically by environmentalists in France and other EU countries.

Mechanical engineers welcome deal

So far, however, there has been little criticism of the EU’s free trade agreement with New Zealand from non-governmental organizations. They are concentrating their resources on Mercosur, Brussels says. In addition, the agreement with New Zealand will include a chapter on sustainability but without the possibility of sanctions. At the beginning of next year, the EU Commission intends to set out in an action plan how it intends to anchor the issue of sustainability in trade deals in the future.

New Zealand’s economic importance for the EU is relatively low. The island state accounts for 0.2 percent of the EU’s trade volume and is the 49th most important trading partner. New Zealand exports mainly agricultural products to the EU, the EU primarily industrial goods to New Zealand. Germany supplied goods worth €1.2 billion to New Zealand in 2020, around a quarter of which was machinery.

The German Engineering Federation (VDMA) welcomes the deal with New Zealand: “Any agreement that lowers tariffs and removes technical barriers to trade benefits mechanical engineering, for which exports to third countries play an important role,” says VDMA trade expert Niels Karssen. However, it is also important that free trade agreements are not only concluded but also enter into force.

The agreement with Mercosur was concluded in June 2019, but has still not been confirmed by the Council and the European Parliament. The UK, which will have to conclude its own free trade agreements after Brexit, agreed on a set of rules with New Zealand in October. In the future, tariffs on wine, honey, and kiwis will fall in the UK. In return, New Zealand will waive tariffs on imports of clothing, ships, and bulldozers from Britain. Silke Wettach

Oil and gas financing: exit with exceptions

After some hesitation, Germany is now one of the 29 supporters of the joint declaration on phasing out international financing for fossil fuels. At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow on Tuesday, the German delegation signed an agreement to this effect, which was already presented last week. This means that in addition to coal, the move away from gas and oil production is now also moving into the focus of international climate protection efforts.

Germany has so far been reticent and has received much criticism for this in recent days. However, it was important to first clarify to what extent the declaration allows exceptions, said BMU State Secretary Jochen Flasbarth in Glasgow. This is because investments in gas may still be necessary as an interim solution for the phase-out of coal-fired power generation and the transition to purely renewable energies. The agreement now signed allows for such exceptions. Flasbarth stressed that these exceptions would only be necessary for a transitional period of a few years, as Germany must become climate-neutral by 2045.

The UK, COP host and originator of the initiative, welcomed the move. “The agreement will allow us to shift public funds to renewable energy, which will create new jobs and growth in the market. This is why countries like Ethiopia and El Salvador have also signed. Because they don’t want ‘stranded investments’ in fossil fuels,” said John Murton, the UK COP presidency delegate.

In total, the declaration could shift an estimated nearly $18 billion annually in public subsidies from fossil fuels to clean energy. til

Studies: 1.5 °C target a long way off

Two reports presented at the World Climate Conference in Glasgow give little cause for optimism on global climate protection. The Climate Action Tracker published its updated analysis of all climate targets, announcements, and measures already implemented on Tuesday. According to the tracker, the planet is currently heading for global warming of 2.7 degrees, compared to pre-industrial levels. This forecast only includes CO2 reduction measures that have already been implemented by law.

Including the NDCs – the countries’ reduction targets – the analysts of the Climate Action Tracker arrive at 2.4 °C of global warming. If climate neutrality targets are added, the figure is 2.1 °C. Only the most optimistic scenario, which also takes into account the potential for carbon sinks such as LULUCF, would achieve the Paris climate target of a maximum of 2 °C with 1.8 °C of global warming and, if possible, 1.5 °C.

Climate protection index: EU slips downwards

The Climate Protection Index 2022, presented by the environment and development organization Germanwatch on Tuesday, also does not give a good report card for the global climate protection ambitions to date. The index annually assesses the climate protection efforts of around 60 countries and the EU in the categories of greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energies, energy consumption, and climate policy.

The authors conclude that the EU is no longer a “high performer” in global climate protection. Although Europe is still considered to play a key role in effective international climate policy, neither the current share of renewable energies nor the expansion target for 2030 is compatible with the Paris Agreement. However, two EU countries are among the top performers in the climate protection index. Denmark is in the first place, followed by Sweden.

Germany ranks 13th, an improvement of six places compared to the previous year. The reason for the increase is the climate protection law passed in June, which provides for a greenhouse gas reduction of 65 percent by 2030 compared to 1990. However, Germany is a long way from the top places due to the coal phase-out in 2038 and the faltering expansion of renewables.

The analysis includes, among other things, how large the share of renewables is in a country, how high the CO2 emissions are per capita and whether the climate targets are on a 1.5 °C path. luk

AIDA chairman sees opportunities in TTC for common AI standards

According to the Chairman of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence (AIDA) in the European Parliament, Dragoş Tudorache (RO, Renew), setting common standards for artificial intelligence (AI) is a central part of the cooperation between the EU and the US in the Trade and Technology Council (TTC). Despite the different approaches to standard-setting, representatives from the US and the EU would discuss this aspect within the Working Group on Cooperation on Technology Standards. This became clear during an AIDA delegation trip led by Tudorache to Washington DC last week.

The trip had focused on exchanges about AI development, work in the TTC, and consolidating dialogue with the AI Caucus – a kind of AIDA counterpart in the US Congress. Supply chains and transatlantic data flows were also on the discussion agenda during meetings with think tanks, NGOs, industry representatives, officials from the White House, the Department of Commerce, and the affiliated standard-setting institute NIST.

The Europeans arrived with a clear message: “There needs to be a strong parliamentary dimension in the TTC.” On the one hand, this includes political control of the TTC chairs and the working groups. On the other hand, it must ensure that the development of AI and its geopolitical significance is discussed in the forum, Tudorache said. The members of Congress had welcomed this demand.

“We Europeans are pioneers at the global level,” says Tudorache, referring to the AI regulation. The MEPs took this as an opportunity to discuss regulatory issues with their counterparts and to find out where common ground might lie. Even though the US is not currently planning a comparable law, there is great interest in the European AI Regulation.

Common goals but different approaches

“There is a common interest in developing a foundation for AI development,” Tudorache reports. This can be based on shared values and a common understanding of democracy and the state’s role in protecting fundamental rights and freedoms. However, it also became clear during the talks in Washington DC that the USA and the EU share the same goals in the field of artificial intelligence but have different ideas about how they want to achieve them.

“The appetite for regulation of AI is less present in Congress, but it is present in the White House,” Tudorache said. “The US will likely work with industry on AI standard-setting, building a bottom-up regulatory framework on a voluntary basis.” The TTC, he said, therefore needs to consider how to achieve the common goals despite the different approaches. The potential of common EU and US AI standards is great, he said: These could be discussed in the context of international standard-setting institutions and thus become global standards.

Tudorache has already made a concrete proposal to his US colleagues: Since the White House is currently working on the “Bill of Rights for Artificial Intelligence“, a kind of declaration of intent, he wants to use the TTC to discuss which intersections this declaration of intent has with the AI regulation or the “inter-institutional declaration for digital principles and rights“. The Commission intends to adopt the declaration by the end of the year. koj

EP reviewers: quick Privacy Shield revision impossible

Behind the scenes, the Biden administration and the EU Commission have been negotiating intensively for months about a follow-up agreement. While the US side is positive, EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders remains expressly cautious about the possibilities of a new edition of the agreement for a legally secure transfer of personal data to the US.

In an expert opinion for the European Parliament’s Committee on Home Affairs (LIBE), the two legal scholars Douwe Korff and Ian Brown, have investigated how difficult the project remains. During yesterday’s presentation and discussion of the results, it became clear once again that fundamental changes in US law would be unavoidable to prevent the European Court of Justice from annulling another adequacy decision by the Commission.

The study, published in July, examined the main US legal framework and aimed to identify points of departure for a possible agreement.

But neither the data protection laws of individual states nor the existing special laws at the federal level could serve as a basis for an adequacy decision by the EU Commission, says study author Douwe Korff. He and co-author Ian Brown are very reluctant to consider the possibility that US companies could comply with the requirements in the context of a sanctioned self-certification with the Federal Trade Commission under the FTC Act. This explicitly does not mean self-regulation – this conceivable option would require tough enforcement by the FTC, which has been lacking in the past. However, even such a system would require changes in US law, Korff said.

Co-author Ian Brown explained that without concrete, permanent and reliable changes to the access possibilities for US authorities and the possibility of an effective legal remedy for those affected, an adequacy decision would be impossible. In particular, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act 702 and Executive Order 12333 are repeatedly in the spotlight – because these basically allow intelligence access to data of non-US citizens, regardless of where they were collected. These are simply too broad to allow a positive adequacy decision.

MEPs urge Commission to be cautious

Many of the MEPs apparently felt encouraged by these legal arguments: German MEP Birgit Sippel (SPD/S&D) accused the EU Commission, which is responsible for the adequacy decisions, of having put relations with the US above the fundamental rights of European citizens in the past, knowing all this: “In order to somehow come close to adequacy, the US has to change its surveillance regime,” Sippel said.

Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld (D66/Renew) went one step further: “Here, I would like to see the Commission live up to its claim of being a geopolitical commission and flex its muscles a bit.” Of course, a functioning data flow is in Europe’s interest – but it is also, and even more so, in America’s interest. “We are behaving like Calimero,” said in ‘t Veld: a well-meaning but always somewhat clumsily naive cartoon character. A safeguard via the President’s Executive Orders could not be sufficient, as is probably currently being sought by the US side: To put it politely, one has seen different kinds of US presidents.

In order to facilitate lasting legal peace in the medium term, the study authors also proposed a “minilateral treaty” that would regulate legal guarantees – Brown and Korff are thinking here of the EU and EEA states and the states of the Five-Eyes grouping, to which Canada, New Zealand and Australia belong in addition to the USA and the United Kingdom.

He was not convinced of this, replied Tom Vandenkendelaere (CD&V/EVP) – what could companies do until such a solution became reality? Study author Ian Brown pointed out that the recommendations of the European Data Protection Board should be heeded. Some potentially non-critical data could possibly be transferred to the USA without the fundamental changes called for, provided an appropriate data protection impact assessment was carried out. fst

More gas from Russia – prices down

Wholesale gas prices fell in Europe on Tuesday after Russian gas flows resumed to Germany, raising hopes that Moscow is carrying out a pledge to increase supplies and ease concerns about shortages and high prices before winter. Russia started pumping gas to Germany again late on Monday via a pipeline from Yamal in Siberia, a day after a halt in exports had pushed up prices in Europe. The gas flows later rose to their highest level in almost two weeks, German data showed.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered state gas company Gazprom this month to increase supplies to Europe and rebuild its inventories there once domestic storage tanks are replenished.
In a sign, it is starting to carry out that order, Gazprom said on Tuesday it had begun pumping gas to five European underground gas storages for November.

Though wholesale prices in European Union countries and Britain fell, market analysts said a bigger drop in prices would depend on Russia doing more to ease European concerns, and on how cold the coming winter is.
Dmitry Marinchenko, senior director at Fitch rating agency, said Gazprom would need to pump around 170 million cubic meters more of gas each day for a month – an increase of about a third on what it is shipping now – to get its European storage refilled. “For such a serious increase in supplies, Gazprom would have to book additional transit capacity via Ukraine – the Nord Stream 1 and Yamal-Europe (pipelines) would not be enough,” Marinchenko told Reuters.

Russia has denied withholding supplies to Europe to exert pressure on German regulators to approve gas shipments through the new Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea. Germany has until early January to certify the pipeline. rtr

Seven EU countries in favor of a single payment system

Seven EU countries have issued a position paper in favor of a uniform European payment system. Germany, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Poland, Finland, and Belgium support the EPI initiative, in which dozens of banks have joined forces. The European Payments Initiative (EPI) includes industry giants such as Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank as well as ING from the Netherlands, Santander from Spain, Unicredit from Italy, and BNP Paribas from France.

The initiative has the potential to facilitate payments in Europe, increase competitiveness and strengthen the single market, said State Secretary for Finance Jörg Kukies on Tuesday. This could make Europe more digital. The common goal is to create payment options that are secure, innovative, and accessible to all. Independence from other regions of the world could thus be increased.

Positive reactions came from the banking industry. “The declaration of the seven important EU states shows the great importance of the EPI initiative and thus a common European payment system,” said Andreas Krautscheid, Managing Director of the Association of German Banks (BdB). The declaration is a strong signal of support for an elaborate and complex trans-European digitalization project.

The EU countries’ two-page paper criticizes the fact that the market for payment services is still highly fragmented. The systems often do not fit together, there are too many national solutions. The time has therefore come for European solutions. Other countries were called upon to join the initiative. The states offered to cooperate on electronic proof of identity and digital currencies. Payments are increasingly being made digitally – a market strongly influenced by the US service Paypal, among others. rtr

Infineon CEO: After the shortage comes the chip bubble

Infineon CEO Reinhard Ploss expects the chip crisis to ease from the second half of 2022. “We are in good shape when car production and chip delivery come into balance in the third quarter,” he said at the “Handelsblatt” car summit. However, there is a lot of catching up to do. Ploss referred to the long lead time in chip production – it takes about a year to build a new factory, the production cycle is then another half a year or even more. The ability of the value chain to respond to increasing demand is limited, he said.

Capacity is currently being built in the industry, said Ploss. That will lead to overcapacity: “We will have a bubble that will disappear, and then everything will be fine,” said Ploss. At the same time, however, he was confident that the higher demand from the automotive industry would be sustainable. Modern cars require significantly more semiconductors than before. Infineon generates around 40 percent of its sales with semiconductors for the automotive industry. rtr

Amazon offers concessions to competition regulators

According to insiders, US online giant Amazon wants to settle two investigations by the EU Commission against it by making concessions. Amazon has entered into initial talks with the competition authorities and hopes to avert high fines or strict requirements, several people familiar with the matter told Reuters. The EU Commission did not want to comment on this.

Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager had accused Amazon in a complaint last November of exploiting its access to the sales and customer data of independent retailers on the Amazon marketplace to focus its own offering on particularly lucrative items. It also initiated a second proceeding to investigate whether the group favors merchants that use its logistics services.

Amazon has now offered concessions to the EU Commission in initial talks to address the concerns, the insiders added. However, the discussions could drag on for months, and their outcome is open. rtr/tho

Ortwin Renn: sustainability and pragmatism

Ortwin Renn is scientific director of the Potsdam Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS).

For many people, the most alarming thing about climate change is the mixture of limited resources and the time we have to implement a sustainable economy. Ortwin Renn has been working for decades to better understand people’s behavior in relation to sustainability. Why is it often so difficult to manage and live sustainably? What solutions are there? The trained sociologist, economist, and journalist has been the scientific director of the Potsdam Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS ) since 2016, where he is dedicated to technology and risk research as well as sustainability studies.

The IASS, which employs just under 150 people, is characterized by its “dual mandate of research on the one hand and policy advice on the other“. So it was a perfect choice for someone who grew up in Jülich next to one of Europe’s most important and controversial nuclear research centers and returned there after completing his doctorate to research society’s perception of nuclear risks – just when the anti-nuclear movement was at its peak.

“It’s a bit of my nature that I see science as an important input to policy-making processes. The area of transfer and communication has to be inherent in the research itself.” Scientists should therefore always consider, alongside their causal research, what processes are needed to make change possible.

No “demonisation” of nuclear energy

This is not the least indication of the applied nature of Renn’s work: “One question that moves me very much is the future of democratic institutions in the context of planetary boundaries. Unacceptable to him is any political vision of the future that ignores the concerns of those who need but do not necessarily want transformation processes. More promising than the mere reproduction of facts, he says, is to use classical democratic institutions to create meaningful cultural narratives with which society can identify.

Renn is similarly pragmatic when it comes to the concrete implementation of a sustainable energy system. Germany is not dependent on nuclear energy. Nonetheless, one must show understanding for those countries that cannot guarantee compliance with the goals formulated in the Green Deal solely through renewable energy. This is where it comes in, to temporarily rely on nuclear energy. “Demonization is as wrong here as glorification.”

Renn explains all of it in an extremely clear and not at all sharp tone. Asked how he personally deals with risks, he answers: He has never been a great daredevil, but he consciously takes risks and then accepts those that are really worth it. No risk, no fun. Julius Schwarzwälder

EUROPE.TABLE EDITORS

Till
Hoppe

Charlotte
Wirth

Falk
Steiner

Timo
Landenberger

Corinna
Visser

Lukas
Knigge

Eric
Bonse

Sarah
Schaefer

Manuel
Berkel

Lisa-Martina
Klein

Markus
Grabitz

Stephan
Israel

Claire
Stam

Dear reader,

Charles Michel chose big words: He was convinced, the Council President said during his Europe speech in Berlin, that the EU could become “the great power of peace of the 21st century“. However, this power is notoriously difficult in dealing with less peaceful neighbors such as the Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko. Michel himself is spontaneously traveling to Poland on Wednesday to discuss solutions to the refugee drama on the border with Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki. “Polish and Baltic borders are European borders,” he stressed.

Despite all the demonstrative optimism for the European project, some things are also going too slowly for Michel. For example, the free trade agreements: “The EU is good at concluding agreements but less good at ratifying them.” Michel sees two starting points here: “We should take inspiration from the more transparent and inclusive method of the Brexit negotiations.” And not to overload the agreements.

One should not believe that one can “solve all the world’s problems at once”. The investment agreement with China, for example, which is on hold, will not transform the People’s Republic into a democracy. But it does create a platform for discussing human rights with Beijing.

Less critical: the agreement with New Zealand. In mid-November, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants to announce an agreement on the free trade agreement between the EU and the island state. But New Zealand’s economic importance for the EU is minor. As Silke Wettach reports, the deal has more symbolic value – especially given the tensions with Australia.

From New Zealand to Glasgow: Since yesterday, Germany has been one of the 29 supporters of the joint declaration to phase out international financing for fossil fuels. This now also involves turning away from oil and gas financing. Germany had been hesitant and had drawn a lot of criticism for it.

And the Federal Republic of Germany is not exactly one of the driving forces in another area either: At today’s transport day of COP26, host Great Britain wants to present an agreement on the Global combustion car phase-out from 2040 present. Germany is holding back, although the declaration would be compatible with the EU’s Green Deal plans. Timo Landenberger and Lukas Scheid have the details.

Your
Sarah Schaefer

COP26: controversy over global combustion engine phase-out

By

Timo Landenberger

A possible date for the global phase-out of the internal combustion engine is becoming the central question on the transport day of the UN climate conference in Glasgow. Today, host Great Britain wants to present an agreement according to which only new cars that no longer emit any pollutants are to be registered worldwide from the year 2040. In leading industrial nations, the zero-emissions limit is to be introduced five years earlier.

However, the agreement has lost some of its explosive power even before its official announcement, as several leading car manufacturers and nations are not among the signatories. As reported by the Financial Times, Germany has so far held back alongside the US and China. In addition, Volkswagen and BMW announced that they would not support the agreement.

This raises questions. After all, the declaration would be perfectly compatible with the EU’s Green Deal plans. The adjustment of CO2 limits for passenger cars as part of the Fit for 55 package envisages a 100 percent reduction in emissions by the year 2035, which would de facto be tantamount to phasing out the internal combustion engine. The BMU says that it has not yet been finally decided whether Germany will sign the agreement. In this respect, it is not possible to comment in more detail at the moment. “We will read the text line by line, word by word, and then decide,” said BMU State Secretary Jochen Flasbarth when asked by Europe.Table.

For Stef Cornelis of the environmental organization Transport and Environment, the German government’s reluctance is incomprehensible. “Germany is once again putting the brakes on climate protection,” says the director of T&E’s Berlin office. The phasing out of the internal combustion engine by 2035 in industrialized countries is absolutely realistic and can also be achieved globally by 2040, he said. The technological possibilities are there, and we just have to start the transformation fast enough.

Volkswagen, the world’s second-largest automaker, sees things differently. The speed of the transformation will vary from region to region, “depending, among other things, on local political decisions that drive investment in electric vehicles and infrastructure,” a VW spokeswoman told Europe.Table. In addition, an accelerated shift to electric mobility would have to be in line with an energy transition towards 100 percent renewables. The group has therefore decided not to sign the declaration.

Greenpeace files suit against VW

According to Martin Kaiser and Roland Hipp, Volkswagen will no longer be allowed to sell combustion engines after 2030. The two Greenpeace directors have therefore filed a lawsuit against the carmaker at Braunschweig Regional Court. This was announced by the environmental organization on Tuesday. Kaiser and Hipp base their demand on calculations by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the International Energy Agency (IEA) on the so-called global greenhouse gas budget.

If VW were to sell more internal combustion vehicles after 2030, which would be on the road for an average of 17 years, the company would drastically exceed the budget to which it is entitled, according to the statement of grounds for the lawsuit. The environmental associations Greenpeace and Deutsche Umwelthilfe had already announced at the beginning of September that they would take German car manufacturers to court for insufficient climate protection measures. BMW was one of the addressees.

In addition to Volkswagen, however, the Bavarian group also announced that it would not sign the agreement on the global phase-out of the internal combustion engine, “as there are still considerable uncertainties regarding the development of the global infrastructure,” according to a BMW spokesman. To that end, there are major differences between markets. With Lukas Scheid

A symbolic deal

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen already has one date firmly in mind: On November 18th, she wants to announce an agreement in principle on the free trade agreement between the EU and New Zealand together with Jacinda Ardern. The New Zealand Prime Minister is expected to stop by Brussels on her way back from the climate conference in Glasgow.

For von der Leyen the deal would have great symbolic value – and not just because it would be convenient for her to have a photo with the popular Ardern. In Brussels, the free trade agreement is also seen as an opportunity to punish Australia. The country’s decision to join the Aukus security alliance with the US and Britain without informing Europeans first has angered many in Europe. France’s President Emmanuel Macron felt snubbed by the cancellation of the multi-billion dollar order for submarines. The EU has also been negotiating a free trade agreement with Australia since 2018, but a deal is not yet in sight.

According to reports, Macron has already assured the New Zealand prime minister of his agreement to the trade deal. However, he backed down from his promise when he took note of the points negotiated so far, according to Brussels.

This is because the deal is likely to provide relief for the import of New Zealand agricultural products in particular. The government in Paris indicated at the end of October that France wanted to put all negotiations on free trade agreements on hold before the presidential elections in May 2022. Macron wants to avoid giving his rival, who is critical of free trade, ammunition from the far left and right in the election campaign.

French farmers traditionally reject the opening of markets for agricultural products from third countries and, in the case of New Zealand, fear competition for dairy products. The deal with the South American Mercosur countries Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay, in particular, is also viewed very critically by environmentalists in France and other EU countries.

Mechanical engineers welcome deal

So far, however, there has been little criticism of the EU’s free trade agreement with New Zealand from non-governmental organizations. They are concentrating their resources on Mercosur, Brussels says. In addition, the agreement with New Zealand will include a chapter on sustainability but without the possibility of sanctions. At the beginning of next year, the EU Commission intends to set out in an action plan how it intends to anchor the issue of sustainability in trade deals in the future.

New Zealand’s economic importance for the EU is relatively low. The island state accounts for 0.2 percent of the EU’s trade volume and is the 49th most important trading partner. New Zealand exports mainly agricultural products to the EU, the EU primarily industrial goods to New Zealand. Germany supplied goods worth €1.2 billion to New Zealand in 2020, around a quarter of which was machinery.

The German Engineering Federation (VDMA) welcomes the deal with New Zealand: “Any agreement that lowers tariffs and removes technical barriers to trade benefits mechanical engineering, for which exports to third countries play an important role,” says VDMA trade expert Niels Karssen. However, it is also important that free trade agreements are not only concluded but also enter into force.

The agreement with Mercosur was concluded in June 2019, but has still not been confirmed by the Council and the European Parliament. The UK, which will have to conclude its own free trade agreements after Brexit, agreed on a set of rules with New Zealand in October. In the future, tariffs on wine, honey, and kiwis will fall in the UK. In return, New Zealand will waive tariffs on imports of clothing, ships, and bulldozers from Britain. Silke Wettach

Oil and gas financing: exit with exceptions

After some hesitation, Germany is now one of the 29 supporters of the joint declaration on phasing out international financing for fossil fuels. At the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26) in Glasgow on Tuesday, the German delegation signed an agreement to this effect, which was already presented last week. This means that in addition to coal, the move away from gas and oil production is now also moving into the focus of international climate protection efforts.

Germany has so far been reticent and has received much criticism for this in recent days. However, it was important to first clarify to what extent the declaration allows exceptions, said BMU State Secretary Jochen Flasbarth in Glasgow. This is because investments in gas may still be necessary as an interim solution for the phase-out of coal-fired power generation and the transition to purely renewable energies. The agreement now signed allows for such exceptions. Flasbarth stressed that these exceptions would only be necessary for a transitional period of a few years, as Germany must become climate-neutral by 2045.

The UK, COP host and originator of the initiative, welcomed the move. “The agreement will allow us to shift public funds to renewable energy, which will create new jobs and growth in the market. This is why countries like Ethiopia and El Salvador have also signed. Because they don’t want ‘stranded investments’ in fossil fuels,” said John Murton, the UK COP presidency delegate.

In total, the declaration could shift an estimated nearly $18 billion annually in public subsidies from fossil fuels to clean energy. til

Studies: 1.5 °C target a long way off

Two reports presented at the World Climate Conference in Glasgow give little cause for optimism on global climate protection. The Climate Action Tracker published its updated analysis of all climate targets, announcements, and measures already implemented on Tuesday. According to the tracker, the planet is currently heading for global warming of 2.7 degrees, compared to pre-industrial levels. This forecast only includes CO2 reduction measures that have already been implemented by law.

Including the NDCs – the countries’ reduction targets – the analysts of the Climate Action Tracker arrive at 2.4 °C of global warming. If climate neutrality targets are added, the figure is 2.1 °C. Only the most optimistic scenario, which also takes into account the potential for carbon sinks such as LULUCF, would achieve the Paris climate target of a maximum of 2 °C with 1.8 °C of global warming and, if possible, 1.5 °C.

Climate protection index: EU slips downwards

The Climate Protection Index 2022, presented by the environment and development organization Germanwatch on Tuesday, also does not give a good report card for the global climate protection ambitions to date. The index annually assesses the climate protection efforts of around 60 countries and the EU in the categories of greenhouse gas emissions, renewable energies, energy consumption, and climate policy.

The authors conclude that the EU is no longer a “high performer” in global climate protection. Although Europe is still considered to play a key role in effective international climate policy, neither the current share of renewable energies nor the expansion target for 2030 is compatible with the Paris Agreement. However, two EU countries are among the top performers in the climate protection index. Denmark is in the first place, followed by Sweden.

Germany ranks 13th, an improvement of six places compared to the previous year. The reason for the increase is the climate protection law passed in June, which provides for a greenhouse gas reduction of 65 percent by 2030 compared to 1990. However, Germany is a long way from the top places due to the coal phase-out in 2038 and the faltering expansion of renewables.

The analysis includes, among other things, how large the share of renewables is in a country, how high the CO2 emissions are per capita and whether the climate targets are on a 1.5 °C path. luk

AIDA chairman sees opportunities in TTC for common AI standards

According to the Chairman of the Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence (AIDA) in the European Parliament, Dragoş Tudorache (RO, Renew), setting common standards for artificial intelligence (AI) is a central part of the cooperation between the EU and the US in the Trade and Technology Council (TTC). Despite the different approaches to standard-setting, representatives from the US and the EU would discuss this aspect within the Working Group on Cooperation on Technology Standards. This became clear during an AIDA delegation trip led by Tudorache to Washington DC last week.

The trip had focused on exchanges about AI development, work in the TTC, and consolidating dialogue with the AI Caucus – a kind of AIDA counterpart in the US Congress. Supply chains and transatlantic data flows were also on the discussion agenda during meetings with think tanks, NGOs, industry representatives, officials from the White House, the Department of Commerce, and the affiliated standard-setting institute NIST.

The Europeans arrived with a clear message: “There needs to be a strong parliamentary dimension in the TTC.” On the one hand, this includes political control of the TTC chairs and the working groups. On the other hand, it must ensure that the development of AI and its geopolitical significance is discussed in the forum, Tudorache said. The members of Congress had welcomed this demand.

“We Europeans are pioneers at the global level,” says Tudorache, referring to the AI regulation. The MEPs took this as an opportunity to discuss regulatory issues with their counterparts and to find out where common ground might lie. Even though the US is not currently planning a comparable law, there is great interest in the European AI Regulation.

Common goals but different approaches

“There is a common interest in developing a foundation for AI development,” Tudorache reports. This can be based on shared values and a common understanding of democracy and the state’s role in protecting fundamental rights and freedoms. However, it also became clear during the talks in Washington DC that the USA and the EU share the same goals in the field of artificial intelligence but have different ideas about how they want to achieve them.

“The appetite for regulation of AI is less present in Congress, but it is present in the White House,” Tudorache said. “The US will likely work with industry on AI standard-setting, building a bottom-up regulatory framework on a voluntary basis.” The TTC, he said, therefore needs to consider how to achieve the common goals despite the different approaches. The potential of common EU and US AI standards is great, he said: These could be discussed in the context of international standard-setting institutions and thus become global standards.

Tudorache has already made a concrete proposal to his US colleagues: Since the White House is currently working on the “Bill of Rights for Artificial Intelligence“, a kind of declaration of intent, he wants to use the TTC to discuss which intersections this declaration of intent has with the AI regulation or the “inter-institutional declaration for digital principles and rights“. The Commission intends to adopt the declaration by the end of the year. koj

EP reviewers: quick Privacy Shield revision impossible

Behind the scenes, the Biden administration and the EU Commission have been negotiating intensively for months about a follow-up agreement. While the US side is positive, EU Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders remains expressly cautious about the possibilities of a new edition of the agreement for a legally secure transfer of personal data to the US.

In an expert opinion for the European Parliament’s Committee on Home Affairs (LIBE), the two legal scholars Douwe Korff and Ian Brown, have investigated how difficult the project remains. During yesterday’s presentation and discussion of the results, it became clear once again that fundamental changes in US law would be unavoidable to prevent the European Court of Justice from annulling another adequacy decision by the Commission.

The study, published in July, examined the main US legal framework and aimed to identify points of departure for a possible agreement.

But neither the data protection laws of individual states nor the existing special laws at the federal level could serve as a basis for an adequacy decision by the EU Commission, says study author Douwe Korff. He and co-author Ian Brown are very reluctant to consider the possibility that US companies could comply with the requirements in the context of a sanctioned self-certification with the Federal Trade Commission under the FTC Act. This explicitly does not mean self-regulation – this conceivable option would require tough enforcement by the FTC, which has been lacking in the past. However, even such a system would require changes in US law, Korff said.

Co-author Ian Brown explained that without concrete, permanent and reliable changes to the access possibilities for US authorities and the possibility of an effective legal remedy for those affected, an adequacy decision would be impossible. In particular, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act 702 and Executive Order 12333 are repeatedly in the spotlight – because these basically allow intelligence access to data of non-US citizens, regardless of where they were collected. These are simply too broad to allow a positive adequacy decision.

MEPs urge Commission to be cautious

Many of the MEPs apparently felt encouraged by these legal arguments: German MEP Birgit Sippel (SPD/S&D) accused the EU Commission, which is responsible for the adequacy decisions, of having put relations with the US above the fundamental rights of European citizens in the past, knowing all this: “In order to somehow come close to adequacy, the US has to change its surveillance regime,” Sippel said.

Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld (D66/Renew) went one step further: “Here, I would like to see the Commission live up to its claim of being a geopolitical commission and flex its muscles a bit.” Of course, a functioning data flow is in Europe’s interest – but it is also, and even more so, in America’s interest. “We are behaving like Calimero,” said in ‘t Veld: a well-meaning but always somewhat clumsily naive cartoon character. A safeguard via the President’s Executive Orders could not be sufficient, as is probably currently being sought by the US side: To put it politely, one has seen different kinds of US presidents.

In order to facilitate lasting legal peace in the medium term, the study authors also proposed a “minilateral treaty” that would regulate legal guarantees – Brown and Korff are thinking here of the EU and EEA states and the states of the Five-Eyes grouping, to which Canada, New Zealand and Australia belong in addition to the USA and the United Kingdom.

He was not convinced of this, replied Tom Vandenkendelaere (CD&V/EVP) – what could companies do until such a solution became reality? Study author Ian Brown pointed out that the recommendations of the European Data Protection Board should be heeded. Some potentially non-critical data could possibly be transferred to the USA without the fundamental changes called for, provided an appropriate data protection impact assessment was carried out. fst

More gas from Russia – prices down

Wholesale gas prices fell in Europe on Tuesday after Russian gas flows resumed to Germany, raising hopes that Moscow is carrying out a pledge to increase supplies and ease concerns about shortages and high prices before winter. Russia started pumping gas to Germany again late on Monday via a pipeline from Yamal in Siberia, a day after a halt in exports had pushed up prices in Europe. The gas flows later rose to their highest level in almost two weeks, German data showed.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered state gas company Gazprom this month to increase supplies to Europe and rebuild its inventories there once domestic storage tanks are replenished.
In a sign, it is starting to carry out that order, Gazprom said on Tuesday it had begun pumping gas to five European underground gas storages for November.

Though wholesale prices in European Union countries and Britain fell, market analysts said a bigger drop in prices would depend on Russia doing more to ease European concerns, and on how cold the coming winter is.
Dmitry Marinchenko, senior director at Fitch rating agency, said Gazprom would need to pump around 170 million cubic meters more of gas each day for a month – an increase of about a third on what it is shipping now – to get its European storage refilled. “For such a serious increase in supplies, Gazprom would have to book additional transit capacity via Ukraine – the Nord Stream 1 and Yamal-Europe (pipelines) would not be enough,” Marinchenko told Reuters.

Russia has denied withholding supplies to Europe to exert pressure on German regulators to approve gas shipments through the new Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea. Germany has until early January to certify the pipeline. rtr

Seven EU countries in favor of a single payment system

Seven EU countries have issued a position paper in favor of a uniform European payment system. Germany, France, Spain, the Netherlands, Poland, Finland, and Belgium support the EPI initiative, in which dozens of banks have joined forces. The European Payments Initiative (EPI) includes industry giants such as Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank as well as ING from the Netherlands, Santander from Spain, Unicredit from Italy, and BNP Paribas from France.

The initiative has the potential to facilitate payments in Europe, increase competitiveness and strengthen the single market, said State Secretary for Finance Jörg Kukies on Tuesday. This could make Europe more digital. The common goal is to create payment options that are secure, innovative, and accessible to all. Independence from other regions of the world could thus be increased.

Positive reactions came from the banking industry. “The declaration of the seven important EU states shows the great importance of the EPI initiative and thus a common European payment system,” said Andreas Krautscheid, Managing Director of the Association of German Banks (BdB). The declaration is a strong signal of support for an elaborate and complex trans-European digitalization project.

The EU countries’ two-page paper criticizes the fact that the market for payment services is still highly fragmented. The systems often do not fit together, there are too many national solutions. The time has therefore come for European solutions. Other countries were called upon to join the initiative. The states offered to cooperate on electronic proof of identity and digital currencies. Payments are increasingly being made digitally – a market strongly influenced by the US service Paypal, among others. rtr

Infineon CEO: After the shortage comes the chip bubble

Infineon CEO Reinhard Ploss expects the chip crisis to ease from the second half of 2022. “We are in good shape when car production and chip delivery come into balance in the third quarter,” he said at the “Handelsblatt” car summit. However, there is a lot of catching up to do. Ploss referred to the long lead time in chip production – it takes about a year to build a new factory, the production cycle is then another half a year or even more. The ability of the value chain to respond to increasing demand is limited, he said.

Capacity is currently being built in the industry, said Ploss. That will lead to overcapacity: “We will have a bubble that will disappear, and then everything will be fine,” said Ploss. At the same time, however, he was confident that the higher demand from the automotive industry would be sustainable. Modern cars require significantly more semiconductors than before. Infineon generates around 40 percent of its sales with semiconductors for the automotive industry. rtr

Amazon offers concessions to competition regulators

According to insiders, US online giant Amazon wants to settle two investigations by the EU Commission against it by making concessions. Amazon has entered into initial talks with the competition authorities and hopes to avert high fines or strict requirements, several people familiar with the matter told Reuters. The EU Commission did not want to comment on this.

Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager had accused Amazon in a complaint last November of exploiting its access to the sales and customer data of independent retailers on the Amazon marketplace to focus its own offering on particularly lucrative items. It also initiated a second proceeding to investigate whether the group favors merchants that use its logistics services.

Amazon has now offered concessions to the EU Commission in initial talks to address the concerns, the insiders added. However, the discussions could drag on for months, and their outcome is open. rtr/tho

Ortwin Renn: sustainability and pragmatism

For many people, the most alarming thing about climate change is the mixture of limited resources and the time we have to implement a sustainable economy. Ortwin Renn has been working for decades to better understand people’s behavior in relation to sustainability. Why is it often so difficult to manage and live sustainably? What solutions are there? The trained sociologist, economist, and journalist has been the scientific director of the Potsdam Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS ) since 2016, where he is dedicated to technology and risk research as well as sustainability studies.

The IASS, which employs just under 150 people, is characterized by its “dual mandate of research on the one hand and policy advice on the other“. So it was a perfect choice for someone who grew up in Jülich next to one of Europe’s most important and controversial nuclear research centers and returned there after completing his doctorate to research society’s perception of nuclear risks – just when the anti-nuclear movement was at its peak.

“It’s a bit of my nature that I see science as an important input to policy-making processes. The area of transfer and communication has to be inherent in the research itself.” Scientists should therefore always consider, alongside their causal research, what processes are needed to make change possible.

No “demonisation” of nuclear energy

This is not the least indication of the applied nature of Renn’s work: “One question that moves me very much is the future of democratic institutions in the context of planetary boundaries. Unacceptable to him is any political vision of the future that ignores the concerns of those who need but do not necessarily want transformation processes. More promising than the mere reproduction of facts, he says, is to use classical democratic institutions to create meaningful cultural narratives with which society can identify.

Renn is similarly pragmatic when it comes to the concrete implementation of a sustainable energy system. Germany is not dependent on nuclear energy. Nonetheless, one must show understanding for those countries that cannot guarantee compliance with the goals formulated in the Green Deal solely through renewable energy. This is where it comes in, to temporarily rely on nuclear energy. “Demonization is as wrong here as glorification.”

Renn explains all of it in an extremely clear and not at all sharp tone. Asked how he personally deals with risks, he answers: He has never been a great daredevil, but he consciously takes risks and then accepts those that are really worth it. No risk, no fun. Julius Schwarzwälder