Co-op campaign for ban on tar sands fuel
June 14, 2010
A coalition led by Manchester’s Co-operative Group has accused EU lawmakers of watering down landmark climate change legislation in order to allow fuels derived from the controversial Canadian tar sands to be imported into Europe.
Last year the European Commission’s proposals for the fuel quality directive penalised tar sands oil for emitting significantly more greenhouse gases than conventional oil, but following lobbying by the Canadian government all reference to tar sands has been dropped.
Now a new coalition made up of The Co-operative, WWF, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and Transport and Environment, is calling upon the Commission to reverse its decision and will publicly campaign for the European parliament to reject the proposals in the autumn.
Article 7a of the fuel quality directive – Europe’s low carbon fuel standard – sets a mandatory six per cent reduction target for the greenhouse gas emissions of EU transport fuels by 2020.
However, by treating tar sands oil the same as conventional oil it could undermine the purpose of the legislation.
Paul Monaghan, head of social goals at The Co-operative, said: “With the adoption of the fuel quality directive and its low carbon fuel standard the EU has sent a clear signal that transport fuels must be decarbonised. We urge the EU to implement the standard to actually achieve this objective and ensure the most climate hostile transport fuels in commercial production today are kept out of Europe.”
WWF-UK’s head of campaigns, Colin Butfield, added: “It seems that some hard lobbying may allow one the dirtiest fuels to be imported into Europe. The extraction of tar sands has heavy environmental consequences.”
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