NEC revision not for now, EU executive insists

The European Commission is going to take further measures to improve air quality in areas such as transport but it has no plans to revise the National Emission Ceilings (NEC) directive any time soon, Janez Potočnik said on Tuesday.

The environment commissioner released a statement following a debate on air quality at the commission. The EU executive agrees that improving the situation is a "pressing need", he said, promising measures on marine fuels and emissions from vehicles and machinery. Many cities are struggling to meet PM10 standards.

Green group EEB welcomed this but said that the EU needed to take a global approach to the problem rather than announcing sporadic measures. This implies an immediate revision of the NEC directive, which deals with the national emissions of four major pollutants. Last year, the commission said it would not revise it until 2013 http://www.endseurope.com/24166?referrer=bulletin&DCMP=EMC-ENDS-EUROPE-DAILY.

In his statement, Mr Potočnik explained that the commission would deal with the NEC revision together with other planned measures to take advantage of synergies between policy areas. These synergies will be highlighted in a forthcoming assessment of the EU's sixth environmental action programme (EAP), he said.

Follow-up: Mr Potočnik's statement http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/11/31&format=HTML

plus EEB reaction http://www.eeb.org/EEB/index.cfm/news-events/news/european-commission-hazy-on-future-air-legislation/.

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