Debate on Fuel quality directive and renewable energy directive during the EP plenary session in Strasbourg. Statements by Nils TORVALDS (ALDE, FI), Rapporteur, Miguel ARIAS CAÑETE, Member of the EC in charge of climate actionand energy, Christofer FJELLNER (EPP, SE), Gerben-Jan GERBRANDY (ALDE, NL), Seb DANCE (S&D, UK), Bas EICKHOUT (Greens/EFA, NL) and Julie GIRLING (ECR, UK)

Strasbourg

debate

plenary session

EICKHOUT, Bas (Greens/EFA, NL)

renewable energy (T)

FJELLNER, Christofer (EPP, SE)

GIRLING, Julie (EPP, UK)

GERBRANDY, Gerben-Jan (ALDE, NL)

ARIAS CAÑETE, Miguel (EPP, ES, EC)

DANCE, Seb (S&D, UK)

TORVALDS, Nils (Renew, FI)

fuel quality (T)

Fuel quality directive and renewable energy directive: extracts from the debate

SOUNDBITE (English), Nils TORVALDS (ALDE, FI), Rapporteur, "We set out to reduce greenhouse gases and we set out to open up Europe for technology progress, and after all the votes in the end we will have to ask ourselves: did we actually achieve what we went out to achieve. And an honest answer is that, actually, we didn't."

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), Miguel ARIAS CA&#209;ETE, Member of the EC in charge of climate actionand energy, "The compromise package aims to facilitate the transition to advanced biofuels. That's highly significant for the future as the communication on the energy union makes clear. Members States will be called upon to set advanced biofuels targets with a reference value of 0.5%. This is not a binding target, that is true, but it is also the case that there's an adjusted deadline for Member States for the level of political ambition for advanced biofuels to be set."

SOUNDBITE (Swedish), Christofer FJELLNER (EPP, SE), "We can have a both end scenario, because I could say that biofuel is a necessary component in terms of climate policy. There are countries such as Sweden where we make use of biofuels in certain types of transport in large scale. But if we're talking about stable and long term target, that is where there is a risk that things might go wrong with this legislative proposal. There are a lot of demands put forward by large segments of this House, particularly on the left and among the Greens, because here we are talking about hard tough limits when it comes to create new advance to biofuels."

SOUNDBITE (English), Gerben-Jan GERBRANDY (ALDE, NL), "We have to realize that biofuels are not the Holy Graal that we thought they were a few years ago. Now, maybe advanced biofuels are, but we have to link this to sustainability criteria and not repeat the same errors of the last few years. I'm going to vote in favour of this result, but it's a very meagre result, President."

SOUNDBITE (English), Seb DANCE (S&amp;D, UK), "We have for many years now seen the effects of a particularly bad policy from the European Union when it comes to biofuels. These effects, some that I have seen by myself in my previous row working for an NGO in areas that were particularly in sub-Saharan Africa where communities have been suffering from the pretty bad effects of the policies that we have been adopting here, in particular the proliferation of crops for biofuel production for fuel consumption here, on land that could and should be used for food production at the betrayal of some local communities whose livelihood depended on that land and of course the unintended consequences of indirect land use change that has resulted from replacement of ecosystems that actually would have contributed to solving the problem of climate change."

SOUNDBITE (English), Bas EICKHOUT (Greens/EFA, NL), "The Commission came forward with a proposal to cap the first generation at 5%. In the Parliament we managed to get to at least a deal around a cap at 6%, but in the Member States they only wanted to be at 7%. Unfortunately in the negotiations we lost this, we, in the end, as a Parliament, agreed with this 7% cap, which is from my perspective way to high because this is just filling up the target with the bad biofuels which are not the ones that we wanted to stimulate, but the more advanced ones."

SOUNDBITE (English), Bas EICKHOUT (Greens/EFA, NL), "We wanted clearly accounting of indirect land use change and this also we lost, we only have reporting, not accounting."

SOUNDBITE (English), Bas EICKHOUT (Greens/EFA, NL), "First of all, biofuels are not the only alternative in town, and that's one of the biggest problems, we are now stimulating one technology in the transport sector that can decarbonize the transport sector, there are many other options, so I think what we have done in our policies is focusing to much on one technology, which is a very stupid thing to do from a political prospective, so you have to put your centre in the decarbonisation and then have different options who can play this game."

SOUNDBITE (English), Julie GIRLING (ECR, UK), "It is absolutely the case that the single most important thing that could have come out from this vote was a mandatory target on advanced biofuels and we did not get that. It was the one thing on which every political group across the spectrum agreed, and we did not get it. And I think that those who were involved in the negotiations should be ashamed of that fact."