«The amendment to article 36 of the European Regulation no. 651/2014 on state aid to companies, approved at the meeting of 9 March, is an error that must be corrected immediately, as it risks actually slowing down the diffusion of the most virtuous technologies for the decarbonisation of heavy transport”. This is what Massimo Artusi (in the photo) claims – vice president of Federauto, with responsibility for Trucks & Vans.
“While countries such as Italy, Germany and Poland demonstrate their willingness to investigate the most appropriate solutions for achieving the decarbonisation objectives of the transport system, enhancing renewable fuels, such as HVO and bio-LNG, the Commission among other things, without any confrontation with the interested parties», continued Artusi, «limits subsidies only to those vehicle technologies with zero tailpipe emissions, such as battery electrics or hybrids, which however do not represent sufficiently mature in the heavy transport sector, penalizing and de facto precluding any possibility of supporting road haulage companies which instead decide to invest in the purchase of C-LNG and Bio-LNG trucks».
«Furthermore», recalled the vice-president of Federauto, «this regulatory change is in opposition to the Community transport decarbonisation policy, confirmed by the recent programmatic document “Green Deal and Industrial Plan”, above all in the light of the fact that the propulsion system of trucks methane already allows the use of bio-LNG with zero carbon emissions».
«In addition», Artusi underlined, «although the possibility remains open – through a specific authorization by the Commission – to encourage investments in commercial vehicles fueled by C-LNG and bio-C-LNG, with the obligation scrapping obsolete vehicles, as is already the case for latest generation diesel vehicles, the measure loses sight of an irrefutable fact for the European market: companies that invest today in innovative and low-emission trucks no longer have anything to scrap. Most C-LNG trucks are purchased by large companies with modern vehicle fleets and often replace young vehicles (5 years and 500,000 km) no longer suitable for high mileage but useful for smaller companies covering low mileage , and therefore cannot be scrapped.
«It is therefore necessary», reiterated and concluded Artusi, «immediately correct the shot, fully including all the technologies formally classified as “clean vehicles” among those eligible for incentives pursuant to art. 36 of Regulation 651/2014″.
