Local and regional governments as service providers

The European Commission adopted a proposal for a directive on the promotion of clean and energy efficient road transport vehicles, on 19 December 2007.

 

The proposal envisages introducing, then imposing environmental.criteria into public procurement of vehicles and transport services. It covers vehicles procured by public authorities and by operators providing public transport services. When procuring vehicles, public authorities will use lifetime costs for CO2 and pollutant emissions as well as for fuel consumption as award criteria. The application of these criteria will first be optional, then mandatory from 2012.

 

The directive is expected, over the long term, to boost the use of clean and energy efficient vehicles and to reduce their costs through economies of scale. It should also improve energy efficiency and the reduction of CO2 and pollutant emissions from the whole vehicle fleet in Europe.

The proposal revises a previous Directive from December 2005 on the promotion of clean vehicles. The revised text covers not only the reduction of pollutant emissions but also CO2 reduction and improvement of energy efficiency. It focuses not only on heavy duty vehicles but applies to all vehicle categories.

The European Commission's proposal for a directive on the promotion of clean and energy efficient road transport vehicles

 

The press release from the European Commission