The European Union's
Acidification Strategy
(II)

Is it consistent with other envisaged EU
legislation
to control acidifying
polluants?

As outlined in the previous article, a properly-designed EU
Acidification Strategy should not be restricted only to a consideration of
the available emission control options and the associated costs to fully
achieve environmental targets over the next 10 to 15 years. Imprecisions
of modelling, inaccurate predictions of energy consumption and energy
mixes, diminishing returns when approaching the 100 per cent ecosystem
protection level and limited financial resources suggest a step-wise
approach where additional legislation is only decided and implemented once
the actual improvement of the environment over the next years deviates
from the path of ultimately meeting the environmental targets by 2010.

The most positive feature of the Acidification Strategy is its
objective to assign overall reduction goals to individual countries. This
approach would ensure that countries are not being restricted from
designing a legislative package of measures which is most cost-effective
for their specific national situations.

To this end it is confusing that the Commission is currently planning
for a series of additional directives which attempt to enact EU-wide
legislation on the very same pollutants addressed by the Acidification
Strategy. The diagram below shows some of this overlapping legislation in
the context of the ‘umbrella legislation’ of the Acidification Strategy
and the Air Quality Framework Directive. While the need for the
harmonization of vehicle emission standards and transport fuel quality is
justified, uniform legislation on emissions from stationary sources is
counterproductive to the principles of the Acidification Strategy which
leaves maximum flexibility to Member States to decide on their most
cost-effective control strategies in line with the subsidiarity
principle.

The following example might illustrate the problems arising from this
‘legislative mix’. The Commission has recently agreed on a proposal for a
directive to limit the sulphur content of heavy fuel oil at 1 per cent
mass maximum. Although the proposal allows certain derogations from this
requirement, if given emission limit values in the flue gas are met, it
nevertheless restricts individual Member States’ flexibility. For example,
the Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD) has granted Member States the
right to regulate emissions from existing Large Combustion Plants until
2003 on a national basis, provided overall emission ceilings are met. The
new initiative (which plans to have the liquid fuels sulphur limit in
place by 1999) will interfere with this existing national legislation. It
is worth mentioning that the current draft proposal for the revision of
the LCPD is also envisaging emission ceilings for all (new and existing)
plants, leaving it again to Member States to determine how to achieve
these ceilings.

In summary

A rational cost-effective approach of limiting emissions from
stationary sources by setting overall national emission reduction targets
is not compatible with the parallel implementation of specific EU-uniform
emission reduction measures addressing the same sources. If the Community
should insist on parallel legislation then it should at least ensure that
the sequence of events is correct; the agreement on Acidification Strategy
targets should be followed by compatible national reduction targets for
LCP emissions. In a final step, Member States should have the right to fix
emission limit values for the various categories of existing LCPs and
leave it completely to the operator of the plants to opt for the proper
mix of measures (low sulphur fuels, flue gas desulphurization, etc.).