Power industry wants flexibility in emissions rules

摘要

The power sector is worried that MEPs will insist on removing or watering down flexibility measures introduced by the Council so as to ease the transition towards implementing the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) for existing large combustion plants (LCPs) after 2016. Faced with air traffic disruption, the Chair of the EP's Committee on the Environment (ENVI), Jo Leinen (S&D, Germany) decided, in Strasbourg on 20 April, to postpone the vote on the directive for one week, to 4 May (when this issue went to press). Lobbying MEPs, power sector association EURELECTRIC argues that flexibility is essential. A "brutal" application of the directive to the oldest plants, says the association, would lead to ever greater gas dependency and corresponding carbon "lock-in" in Europe.