Greenpeace: Expert: Germany must stand by the combustion engine

In the poker game about a ban on new cars with internal combustion engines, Greenpeace is urging the federal government to vote yes. “It is difficult to imagine that Germany is driving the EU climate plans to the brink of failure just because the FDP wants to save the internal combustion engine with expensive and completely inefficient synthetic fuels,” said Greenpeace traffic expert Tobias Austrup of the German Press Agency.

The federal government must adhere to the clear wording on climate protection in the coalition agreement and push for an exit much earlier than 2035. The date is too late to limit global warming to below 1.5 degrees compared to pre-industrial times.

If the EU states agree to the plan to phase out combustion engines at the meeting of environment ministers on Tuesday, it will almost certainly come into force. Formally, there still has to be an agreement with the EU Parliament. However, this has already spoken out in favor of a ban.

“It is likely that others will follow if Berlin does not vote to ban new cars with internal combustion engines by 2035,” an EU diplomat told dpa. The “Süddeutsche Zeitung” reported in its Friday edition that Italy, Portugal, Bulgaria, Romania and Slovakia spoke out against a ban in a joint paper. “Italy would like to have a loophole for luxury cars like Ferrari,” said the EU diplomat. The “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung” and the “Handelsblatt” also report on other countries that may not agree to the project and could possibly prevent it.

After the EU Parliament followed a proposal by the EU Commission a good two weeks ago to de facto ban the sale of new cars with combustion engines from 2035, a dispute about the German position flared up in the federal government. Environment Minister Steffi Lemke (Greens) had already spoken out in favor of this on behalf of the federal government in March – but now Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) has questioned this position with new statements. At Industry Day in Berlin on Tuesday, he said he had decided that the federal government would not agree to this European legislation.

The core of the dispute is the use of synthetic fuels, so-called e-fuels. While the Greens only want to allow e-fuels in certain areas, such as aviation or special vehicles, the FDP wants standard cars to be able to be refueled with e-fuels in the future. Critics complain that it is significantly more energy-intensive to operate cars with synthetic fuels than purely electrically and that there are already too few for aviation and shipping.