Proposition 53K2901

Proposition de résolution concernant la promotion des véhicules qui utilisent le CNG comme carburant.

General information ¶

Authors

CD&V Jef Van den Bergh
LE Christophe Bastin
MR Valérie De Bue, Valérie Warzée-Caverenne

Submission date

June 21, 2013

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

natural gas motor car greenhouse gas tax incentive air quality environmental protection resolution of parliament motor fuel reduction of gas emissions

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP ∉ Open Vld N-VA LDD MR VB

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

Dec. 5, 2013 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mrs Linda Musin, rapporteur, refers to her written report.

European road transport is currently 94 % dependent on oil. Most of this oil is imported. This includes a price tag of about 1 trillion euros per day.

Not only economically, but also for the environment, the costs are high. Earlier this year, the European Commission launched its Clean Power for Transport Directive. That directive aims to encourage alternative vehicle technologies by setting ambitious targets for tank and load fracturing structures. As regards CNG vehicles, the Directive provides that by 2020 each Member State must have a publicly accessible CNG pump every 150 kilometers. After all, today CNG vehicles are trapped in a chicken or egg story. CNG tank stations are not or barely built because there are insufficient natural gas vehicles, and natural gas vehicles are not sold because there is no or insufficient tank infrastructure. The directive will allow to break this pattern.

With the present resolution, we want to draw on the car. CNG vehicles are hardly known to the general public in our country. Some companies and some local governments are trying to change that today. We ask the federal government to also make the necessary efforts and take measures, following countries such as Italy, Germany, France and the Netherlands, where natural gas vehicles are today on a steep rise.

Five years ago, in November 2008, I first submitted a resolution to promote CNG vehicles. In the answers I received to parliamentary questions at the time, LPG vehicles were constantly discussed. CNG and LPG are often confused. However, they have little to nothing to do with each other. The existence, capabilities and benefits of CNG vehicles are still far too little known.

However, the benefits are clear. CNG scores in terms of safety as high as conventional fuels. CNG vehicles emit as much as no fine dust and have a much lower CO2 emission than conventional fuel vehicles. The technology is ready. This is ⁇ not insignificant. Today, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of cars drive around on CNG. Those are perfectly able to compete in terms of fixing distances and techniques with vehicles driving on the familiar, traditional fuels. They reduce the impact on the environment and are also an ideal intermediate step towards fully green technologies at a time when biogas will be sufficiently available.

For CD&V, the pursuit of sustainable mobility is an en-and-story. Of course, we want to encourage people to choose the most sustainable mode of transportation, but that does not mean that we are going to ban the car. For movements for which the car remains the most flexible and suitable means of transport, we strive for as proper technology as possible and for rational car use.

Promoting the use of CNG vehicles fits perfectly into this vision of sustainable mobility. We therefore hope that this resolution – thanks to colleague De Bue for the initiative – will receive the necessary support, as was the case in the committee, and that the government, in line with the policy note of Secretary of State Wathelet and with the support of the European directive, will make the necessary efforts to finally get CNG vehicles on the map in our country.

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, I will be quite brief since our colleague Van den Bergh has well explained the whole context of the resolution. I would simply like to remind you that this proposal is part of European environmental objectives.

We must raise public awareness of these challenges and above all offer them credible alternatives. We must encourage the government to take a series of initiatives that could encourage the introduction of natural gas vehicles, as other countries have already done.

Specifically, we believe that the federal authority has a capacity to act, for example by fixing excise duties at the European minimum. This will encourage investors to bet on natural gas vehicles. We therefore call for a clear, more advantageous tax framework for natural gas vehicles.

Our Government must make every effort to promote the construction of natural gas supply points, on new or existing sites, by rapidly integrating CNG stations rules into the regulations, and also consider support measures.

We call for increased awareness of this alternative fuel, as well as the creation of a task force in which specialists from the federal state as well as the Regions develop incentive measures. CNG is at the intersection of several skills that are under the jurisdiction of different levels of power.

The implementation of these measures aimed at promoting the natural gas car will be a step towards achieving the EU’s targets of reaching 13% renewable energy and reducing CO2 emissions by 15% by 2020.

Mr. Secretary of State, during the discussion of this resolution, your cabinet presented the plan that will be unveiled in mid-January. The desire to re-create a working group within the task force will therefore result in a series of proposals and actions. We hope that this resolution will contribute to the rapid implementation of the concrete measures you will announce soon.

I would like, like Mr. Van den Bergh, thank all colleagues who supported this proposal unanimously during committee discussions.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Secretary of State, the resolution that we present today for approval to this Parliament and which was unanimously approved by the Chamber Committee is a step forward.

However, in the interests of this dossier, we cannot satisfy ourselves with this resolution alone. They are figs after Easter. I would like to remind you that in the past, both you and your predecessor, Mr Magnette, have been referred to by my group to a number of findings. I refer, among other things, to a number of interventions by colleague Rita De Bont who in this regard questioned both Mr Magnette and you in 2010 and 2012 about the slow progress in Belgium of the evolution of electric vehicles and CNG vehicles. We also know that not all mistakes lie in your policies, but the measures you have taken so far have made us into a situation that we cannot satisfy at all.

At the beginning of this year, the European Commission announced that it intends to reach 20 000 charging points for Belgium alone by 2020. Mr. Secretary of State, 20 000 charging points for electric vehicles, still apart from the CNG problem, which makes you have to perform a massive collection operation.

In 2011, Belgium had no more than 188 charging points for electric vehicles. You can count a little, Mr. Secretary of State, so you know that in less than 7 years we must get from 188 charging points to 20 000 charging points, only for electric vehicles.

The [...]

You can say it louder. When it comes to the loading points, I would also like to hear it, Mr. Secretary of State.

[...] I’m listening.

There should be an increase from 188 to 20 000...

I am honored, the Secretary of State is now a full attention.

I would like you to show the same respect to your colleagues in the committee.

We will indeed return to it, on respect for colleagues, on mutual respect.

Let’s get to the most important thing in this day of Saint Nicholas.

Mr. Secretary of State, it is clear that the problems you are facing here, and the demands imposed by the European Commission, urge you to do something. Not so much this resolution but Europe urges you to take the necessary measures. You are shooting too short.

On the one hand, there is the problem of electric vehicles, on the other hand, that of vehicles powered by liquefied gas, which this resolution deals with.

In the coming years, all major ports should be equipped with fixed or mobile gas stations for liquefied natural gas. On the major European roadways, trucks must be able to refuel every 400 kilometers of liquefied gas. Cars should be able to operate compressed natural gas every 150 kilometers.

If we see what the sober and modest objectives of this resolution are, which in fact urge you to do a little bit of what Europe demands, then I think we are far from what you will have to ⁇ politically in the coming months. To reassure you, however, the industry has responded in the sense that by 2020 Belgium will only have to install 12 000 of the 20 000 charging points for electric vehicles. Again, in 2011 only 188 were installed, while in 2020 there should be 12 000. I am afraid that you will have little time for a fun coffee chat during plenary meetings...

If we look at the CNG gas stations themselves, only in Flanders this year only 4 permits were delivered for new gas stations. This makes for a total of 18 in Flanders. You may later be able to communicate the figures for Wallonia. However, the licensing policy is also strict. We also note that the realization of these new gas stations leaves a lot of waiting.

This, of course, creates a very dual situation, Mr. Minister. On the one hand, these vehicles are very expensive, on the other hand, there is not a large enough supply to make use of charging points, both for CNG vehicles and for electric vehicles.

Now let’s talk about your policy, apart from the number material, Mr. Secretary of State.

In your policy letter and in the discussion of it you put a lot of time; we should have experienced that this week. When you introduced your first policy letter about electric vehicles two years ago, we had to put it in a short passage. I quote: “Finally, in perfect cooperation with the regions and all stakeholders, a master plan will be developed to encourage the development of electric vehicles in the Belgian market.” How can we urge you to hurry with our sober resolution, if you are not even able to comply with your own policy letter? Don’t worry, we’ll give you one more year. We will see what you wrote in your policy letter for 2014.

Until then, we have to do it again with a slightly longer passage, namely, with two quotes. I quote: “From a transversal approach to the whole of his powers, the State Secretary for Energy, Mobility and Environment will use all the leverages at his disposal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as well as the pollution caused by the different modes of transport and energy production. At the crossroads of these three powers, he will support a large transversal project for the development of low-carbon electric vehicles.”

Mr. Secretary of State, where is your major transversal project? Maybe you put it in your pocket or you left it in the coffee room. At least I haven’t seen anything yet. However, we are giving you another chance; last time, good night in 2014. We also look forward to your policy letter 2014, as a child is waiting for what Sinterklaas has put in his shoe.

Also in this regard, I quote — although you seem to have had little creativity, as can be seen on the copy/paste —: “At the crossroads of these three powers, I will support a large transversal project for the development of low-carbon electric vehicles. In a joint approach with other FODs and the regions, I will advocate a sustainable emission standard in the light of Horizon 2020 for vehicles and trucks.” You add the following passage – you seem to have been inspired by a Blue Monday –: “Natural gas-powered vehicles can also play an important role in medium-term mobility.”

The environmental performance of these vehicles is significantly better than that of gasoline or diesel vehicles. For CNG and LNG, the criteria will be determined in terms of the technical standards to which the installations must comply and in terms of the capacity of the installers and their control.”

I also know the advantages of electric vehicles and CNG vehicles. This is just page filling, but has nothing to do with your policy.

What we do here is putting up a big balloon. To you, Mr. Secretary of State, to say again here today that you will take this into account and work on it. You have been saying this for three years, but in the last three years you have done nothing in that area. Instead of a brave resolution in which we ask you to do a little more of your best, you should get a red card as you have not made the slightest effort in the past three years to realize anything in this file.