This is idiotic. The EU carbon trading cabal has decided to extort the rest of the air travel world starting in 2012. In a nutshell, they’ll ban flights from landing if the airlines don’t engage in carbon trading. It’s yet another variation of the “Plane Stupid” theme.
Benny Peiser of the GWPF alerts us to the translation of the article in the German magazine Handelsblatt
By Thomas Ludwig
Foreign airlines are threatened with a flight and landing ban from 2012 in the European Union if they do not participate in emissions trading.
The ban is proposed in an internal document by the EU Commission seen by Handelsblatt. Summarised on nine pages, the guidelines describe how such a ban could be implement. The Commission considers a flight and landing ban as a last resort to make the airlines surrender over its Emissions Trading Scheme.
An EU Directive stipulates that airlines from Europe and third countries are mandated to be included in the trading of emissions rights. On their flights to and from Europe, they may then only emit as much CO2 as the CO2 certificates they hold. 85 percent of the certificates are free of charge while 15 percent of the allowances have to bought via auctions.
“The whole project has not been thought through. The EU cannot impose its law on third countries,” Holger Krahmer, environmental spokesman for the German Liberal Party in the EU Parliament told Handelsblatt.
In fact, international resistance against the EU plan is growing. Several American, Asian and African airlines are suing the EU over its emissions trade project. The US Aviation Association ATA is attempting to have the policy suspended by the European Court of Justice. And the Russian government has also voiced its displeasure in Brussels.
Not even critics of the project believe that the European Commission will actually ban flights by American and other foreign airlines. “They will use it as leverage, and accept compensation measures,” estimates Liberal MEP Holger Krahmer. The EU Commission is looking for a face-saving way out: “What remains are the costs of CO2 allowances, which will only burden European airlines and make them uncompetitive” Airlines such as Lufthansa and Air Berlin had already warned of this danger in the legislative process.
“The EU has once again overestimated itself,” said Krahmer. “The project was not thought through. The EU cannot impose its legal authority on third countries.”
At the end of September, the general assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) will take place. Some countries, such as the U.S. want to adopt a resolution, which will make clear that emissions trading systems may only be applied by mutual agreement.
“Greenhouse gas emissions have increased dramatically, particularly in air traffic,” said Social Democrat MEP Matthias Groote. The climate expert warns against granting exemptions to noncompliant airlines from third countries. “If the U.S. and other countries try to suspend the EU emissions trading regime for third countries, it would lead to a huge distortion of competition for European airspace.” It is more important than ever to integrate international aviation into the EU’s emissions trading system. After all, the emissions of greenhouse gases in air traffic have doubled in the past two decades.
The EU Directive, which includes aviation in emissions trading, is part of a package of regulations with which the EU wants to meet its climate protection goals. Emissions of greenhouse gases should fall by a fifth by 2020 under the 1990 level […]
The inclusion of aviation in the Emissions Trading Scheme will impact consumers too. According to calculations by the EU Commission, a ticket for a return flight within the EU could become more expensive by up to nine Euros because of emissions trading. For long-haul flights, larger price increases can be expected, a return ticket to New York could be up to 40 Euros more expensive. [translation by Philipp Mueller]
Full story here: Handelsblatt, 22 September 2010
h/t to Benny Peiser http://www.thegwpf.org
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The problem is that there is a hugh gap between politicians and daily life in Europe. Especially in the Netherlands and Germany politicians are mainly bread within the “civil servant community”. Most of them never had a job in the outside, real world.
Also the green parties in these countries attracted a lot of communists since the fall of communism in Europe.
There is also a hughe anti-USA mentality along the greenies over here in Europe and some do refuse to show any interest in the USA in general.
(Now you can ask yourself, where are flights to and from the EU come and go to, exactly, the US!)
There are a few politicians who do recognize this problem, Sarkozy and Cameron are two of them.
Hopefully they will succeed as politicians. Also, there is a growing dissatisfaction on “green politics” in Europe!
If this EU scam actually goes into effect then the US should slap a tariff on all sales of Airbus aircraft to US-based airlines. The revenue generated from such a tariff could then be used to cancel out the carbon tax being unjustly levied against Americans traveling to Europe by plane. Problem solved.
No problem here.
Switzerland is not a member of the EU.
So just fly to Geneva and then take a train. At over 200 mph you can be almost anywhere in about a day.
This is the reality of the socialist state modeled on the old USSR. America will follow shortly if this madness continues.
I’m looking for some backers for my new carbon trading wheeze.
Us clean living and virtous Europeans live in a cool areas where the oceans surounding us are huge net sinks of Co2. Those right wing shills of big oil living in hot countries with tropical seas around them have oceans that are constantly outgasing vast amounts of CO2 and are therefore ‘sources.’ They are the prime cause of the soaring temperatures that are threatening our very existence on this planet .
From now on those of us in cold countries (the sinkies) will start charging the unprincipled ‘sourcies’ for storing in our oceans the foul and polluting Co2 that the sourcies are wilfully letting out into the atmosphere without a thought for the rest of us on this planet.
I am unsure of the method of charging, perhaps 1 penny for each gramme of co2 absorbed in each tonne of sea water?
I have yet to work out the details for those living in hot or cold countries who don’t have a coastline-guess they will have to be exempted.
Backers urgently sought.
tonyb
The Italian and Spanish mafia are both involved at very high levels in carbon trading schemes.
Yet another EU screw up. Time to pull the plug on this bogus group of bureaucrats. None of the electorate of the member states want an integrated ‘Unite States of Europe’ – Brussels has no mandate to govern.
Here’s hoping this proposed CO2 tax on foreign flights is the final straw that makes this EU house of cards come tumbling down!
Welcome to the Union of European Socialist Republics, or the Peoples Democratic Republic of the European Union! I think I just prefer to call it Disneyland, where the fantasists & fruit loops live in an unreal world! Actually that is rather unfair to Disneyland, you can have a jolly good laugh in that wonderful place in the full knowledge that none of it is real. Unfortunately the EU is not quite as entertaining, unless you can step outside the asylum for a moment & laugh at how rediculous they really are! Oh well back to reality.
Off to a compulsory retraining centre again at the weekend to have my evil wicked independent thoughts re-educated by the collective, they are really nice guys you know once you get to know them, they’re nice pleasant smiles & warm greetings & tranquility, no one ever shouts or gets angry or excited there, or expresses an opinion that hasn’t been approved in triplicate by committee beforehand, bliss!! The one bowl of rice per day & the two glasses of tepid water are really nutritious they tell me. Some inmates are rather unpleasant, one chap spread horrid rumours that our beautiful leaders in Brussels are a bunch of self-deluded, self-opiniated, self-enriching control freaks, sponging off the hard-pressed taxpayer with huge expense accounts that are never vetted, travelling all over the world business class to exotic locations dining on champagne & caviar & lobster, but I haven’t seen him for some time, & I was told by my kind & caring re-educator that he had been invited to speak at a “private function” when suddenly the platform gave way beneath him! I knew I shouldn’t have left that 11W CFL on in the kitchen for 7¾ minutes longer than permitted. Resistance is futile! (Yes I am joking, well err…….I think I am?).
More greenmail.
“Back in the 1980s, “greenmail”, an amalgam of blackmail and greenback, referred to the practice of buying enough shares in a company to threaten a takeover, thereby forcing the company to buy the shares back at a premium. As the practise and word have since faded away, perhaps it’s time to revive the term “greenmail” and invest it with new meaning. Greenmail occurs when officials and activists with media power disrupt stability and certainty in a particular industry, maintaining pressure and an air of crisis, to intimidate business leaders who hold out against some senseless green measure.“
Sorry about the typos!
Let’s see now, this is a move to ‘protect the competitiveness of EU airlines’. In other words, they don’t want people to stop flying, thereby reducing emissions, they just want to hold on to their ‘nice little earners’.
Well, if they do actually implement such gross stupidity, all the rest of the world needs to do is to deny landing rights to EU airlines. They’ll soon drop it.
So the European Union now erects the Carbon Wall. Nice.
And we have how many troops stationed over there at what cost?
I don’t understand something, how do they ‘help’ to save the planet with our carbon tax money?
I hope they rot in jail one day.
Please do not forget who started it:
Europeans who are allowed to travel to the US without a visa
1) have to register electronically before the trip (ESTA)
2) have to pay 14$ for doing this since 8 September 2010
3) have to give the same information to the airline before departure
4) have to fill in a form with the same information on the plane
5) have to spend half an hour (at least, if lucky) going through immigration
So, why are Americans complaining?
davidmhoffer says
Quote
Someone will do an article showing that airlines have adjusted their long haul routes so that they refuel in a low tax country a bit out of their way instead of refueling on the shortest stop over point due to higher taxes.
Unquote
I believe Emirates does that already. Instead of its long haul flights terminating in Australia and paying the huge overnight fees, they fly on to Auckland and rest there to return the next day refreshed and in pocket.
rbateman, it’s actually the ‘Carbon Curtain’.
Your US President will broker peace, by imposing an immediate environmental TAX, that will be invested with the Chicago Carbon-collateral for good health Exchange, sign a US/Euro carbon neutral treaty to placate the euro environmentalists plus, impose by regulation increased departure, landing, transit, passenger carbon taxes. Easily fixed when you have an agenda. all too easy..
Good to see a guy from the FDP speaking up against this. Maybe there is still a hope for sanity in Germany.
Al Gore’s Holy Hologram said on September 28, 2010 at 1:40 am
Oh come on, all those carbon trading schemes are invitations to commit fraud by ANYONE. And the possibilities for legal “fraud” are very enticing.
The airlines will cave in, citing that they have no choice. They will buy their credits in large blocks to save on transaction fees, when the market is low. They will divvy up the costs to the passengers, figured at the full price to buy them per flight, using the current market price or the price they bought them at (whatever is higher), to which will will be tacked on an “administrative fee”…
I fully sympathise with the howls of outrage from North American commenters feeling they must cancel their European holiday arrangements. We Europeans have been making a similar decision not to visit the US since Dubya launched his “war on tourism”, with its intrusive, humiliating and slow border checks that could only ever catch the most stupid and therefore ineffectual terrorists. And it hasn’t even caught any of those, although it has managed to expel a number of perfectly respectable people, like say, Yusuf Islam.
Pamela Gray says:
September 27, 2010 at 8:54 pm
“One of these days I was hoping to travel to Ireland and visit the graveyards and homelands of my ancestors (“Ulster Scots”). This would nix that in short order.”
_________
Nil desperandum, Pamela. There’s one guy at least who’ll pick you up at the door!
You may even find a seat next to the illustrious James Delingpole!
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100053140/why-from-now-on-im-flying-ryanair/
Go n-éiri an bóthár leat!
Seems like a good idea to me; isolate Europe from the rest of the world.
The beneficial effect would be to shield the rest of humanity from euromadness, with it’s symptoms of extreme windmania and carboncraziness. Some of these things have spread, but here it’s chronic.
So, rest of world please stay away from us in the EUSSR. It is now a giant nuthouse, with the loonies running it
We may have already infected His Presidentness O’Barmey and some of his oppos.
Sorrrreee bout that yanks, pologise, Byeee.
“kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:”
Africa is the real motherland, ie, Out of Africa. We can all trace our mitochondrial DNA, on our mother’s side, to Africa. But there is another view, Out of Australia. So far, I am not aware if the DNA can/has be/been traced to Australia.
I vote for this!
We have the Olympics in 2012. Businesses based in London are being advised to shut down during that to save power and ease congestion. If people are thinking of coming, bring fans. Partly to enjoy the experience of being packed into one of the world’s oldest underground railway systems, and also to point at our wind turbines if it’s calm. Any biologists may also want to bring sampling kits. All sorts of interesting things breeding in our warm, moist tunnels. Anyway, if you can buy CO2 credits on CCX and sell them on ECX, you should be able to fund your trip easily. EU CO2 is like our Stella, reassuringly expensive.
This should give added impetus to the Campaign for an Independent Britain and other Eurosceptic groups. http://www.eurofaq.freeuk.com/cib/index.html
Oh, when will the Greenie madness end? Perhaps at Cancun?