1. Thematic Strategy on Air Pollution
CAFE Steering Group 18 November 2004
Duncan Johnstone
Clean Air & Transport Unit
DG Environment

2. What the 6th EAP says Coherent and integrated policy and measures &
consistent with other actions including climate, soil, urban and water protection.
Assess progress in addressing Health & Environment
Objectives:
‘achieving levels of air quality that do not give rise to significant negative impacts on and risks to human health and the environment’; (Art 7.1. of 6th EAP)
‘no exceedence of critical loads for acidification or eutrophication’
Thematic Strategy on air pollution to be adopted by July 2005
The 6th Environmental Action Programme (Decision 1600/2002/EC) was adopted jointly by the Council and the European Parliament in July 2002.
The 6EAP:
Obliges the Commission to propose a thematic strategy on air pollution not later than in July 2005.
States that the Thematic strategy shouyld be be coherent and take an integrated approach and ensure linkages through to other environmental areas such as climate change.
“a thematic strategy to strengthen a coherent and integrated policy on air pollution to cover priorities for further actions, the review and updating where appropriate of air quality standards and national emission ceilings with a view to reach the long term objective of no-exceedence of critical loads and levels and the development of better systems for gathering information, modelling and forecasting”
(Art 7 (f) of the 6EAP “Objectives and priority areas for action on environment and health and quality of life”)
stipulates that the thematic strategy should achieve levels of air quality that do not give significant negative impact on human health and the environment. This is in line with the Treaty where the objective is to achieve a high degree of environmental protection. However, we do not know exactly how to define “significant” since this is ultimately a political judgement on what is acceptable.
requires the Thematic Strategy to be published by July 2005.
A critical load is, for a particular ecosystem, a level of pollution below which the ecosystem ought not to be at significant risk of harm. The 6EAP sets an objective of no exceedence of critical loads for acidification and eutrophication.
Excess nitrogen inputs to a given ecosystem which are above the critical load may put the ecosystem at risk of eutrophication. This has implications for biodiversity as many plants succeed in nitrogen deficient environments such that if when there is excess nitrogen, plant communities may change in favour of more nitrophillic species.

3. What is the Thematic Strategy?
A stock-take of where we are against 6th EAP objectives (up to 2020);
Identification of the remaining challenges;
Identification of the level of ambition and the amount of progress we can make towards long term objectives; and
A statement of intent on how we will tackle remaining problems and emerging issues.

4. Thematic Strategy accompanied by an impact assessment
The TS in more detail..(1)
Thematic Strategy accompanied by an impact assessment
Thematic strategy only a 15 page communication adopted by the College
Impact assessment (ca. 40 pages) includes more analysis of the problems and of policy options - in the form of a staff working paper (English)

5. The TS in more detail..(2) Possible Content
Description of progress against air quality objectives (human health & environment)
Identification of persistent problems and emerging issues
Assessment of how much further progress we can make towards long-term objectives – the “level of ambition”
Recognition of changing mix of emissions sources (e.g. growing importance of ships)

6. The TS in more detail..(3) Possible Content continued…….
Indication of measures that can assist
Emphasis on better implementation & simplification of legislation
Some new measures/commitments to address persistent problems
Identification of useful national measures
Integration of environmental policies (ships, agriculture)
Address new issues (e.g. hemispheric pollution)
Links through to other policy areas such as biodiversity, urban thematic strategy, soils, marine, water quality
Future assessment/evaluation of policies
Research needs, timescale

7. Issues to be addressed in TS
Human health priorities
PM2.5 – new limit value? New emission ceiling?
Ozone – new NOx and VOC controls in the NECD?
Environment
Eutrophication & loss of biodiversity (ammonia)
Remaining acidification problems (ammonia)
Ozone damage to forests
Influence of global emissions and consequences for EU regional air quality

8. Possible Measures Streamlining current Air Quality legislation
Consolidation & simplification of ambient air quality legislation (e.g. reporting)
Improving implementation by Member States
Possible new vehicle emissions limits
To reduce particulate matter in particular
Small scale combustion
Product emission standards and Integrated Pollution Prevention & Control to reduce emissions of particulate matter & nitrogen oxides
Integration measures
Agriculture (IPPC, less fertiliser, animal waste disposal etc.)
Transport (charging & other measures to reduce pollution)
ship emissions (more action in the IMO for cleaner engines)
Possible Measures
Making our legislation work better. We can improve our legislation so that it is more effective and rmoeves some of the unnecessary burden from the Member States.
However, Member States must also play their part in ensuring better implementation. We know of example where there are widespread exceedences of limit values but Member States are not forthcoming with plans and programmes to remedy such exceedences.
Other Measures
These are only suggestions at the current time as the cost optimisations and analyses using the RAINS model have not been completed.
The Commission is considering
How to make its existing legislation work better and is looking at consolidating and revising the acquis on air quality, and in particular the obligations on reporting.
There may be new measures to tackle the priority pollutants, in particular particulate matter emitted from small scale combustion plants and vehicles.
In addition, there needs to be a greater emphasis on incorporating environmental concerns into other policy areas such as agriculture and possibly shipping if protection of natural ecosystems is to be achieved.

9. Launch public consultation (Nov/Dec 2004)
Next Steps
Consultation with stakeholders on optimisation scenarios – environmental targets (ongoing)
Launch public consultation (Nov/Dec 2004)
Discuss outline Thematic Strategy with stakeholders (Feb 2005)
Commission adopts Thematic Strategy in 2nd quarter 2005
Next Steps
The development of the Strategy continues with intergated assessment model runs for a range of possible environmental objectives. The Strategy will ultimately establish the Community’s desired level of environmental ambition.
Consultation with Member States and other stakeholders continues during this process with several meetings planned to consult on the emergeing results.
The Aarhus Convention on access to environmental information and public particpation in decision making requires that a public consultation be instigated on the possible content of the Thematic Strategy (in broad terms only). This we hope to launch in November/December of this year.
It is foreseen that the Thematic Strategy will be adopted by the College before the Summer of 2005 in line with the requirements of the 6th EAP.
More information and the progress of CAFE and the development of the Thematic Strategy can be obtained by consulting the CAFE web site where all new information will be posted.

10. Link with the review of National Emission Ceilings
Resource constraints dictate that the review of the NECD will come after the Thematic Strategy
The Thematic Strategy will contain a clear indication of the level of environmental ambition to be pursued by the revision of the NECD
The review of the NECD will be a fine-tuning exercise based upon updated energy projections, and emissions forecasts & inventories (e.g. PM2.5, ammonia)
In keeping with the views of the EPRG, close links will be maintained between the NECD revision and the Thematic Strategy.