PURPOSE: to approve, on behalf of the European Union, an Amendment to the 1999 Protocol to the 1979 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution to Abate Acidification, Eutrophication and Ground-Level Ozone.
NON-LEGISLATIVE ACT: Council Decision (EU) 2017/1757 on the acceptance on behalf of the European Union of an Amendment to the 1999 Protocol to the 1979 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution to Abate Acidification, Eutrophication and Ground-Level Ozone.
CONTENT: the Council adopted a Decision approving, on behalf of the behalf of the European Union, the Amendment to the 1999 Protocol to the 1979 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution to Abate Acidification, Eutrophication and Ground-Level Ozone, set out in Decision 2012/2/EC of the Executive Body of the Convention.
The Union is a party to the 1999 Protocol to the 1979 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution to Abate Acidification, Eutrophication and Ground-Level Ozone (‘the Gothenburg Protocol’).
The parties to the Gothenburg Protocol opened negotiations in 2007 with a view to improving further the protection of human health and the environment, including through the establishment of new emission reduction obligations for selected air pollutants to be achieved by the year 2020 and the updating of emission limit values addressing emissions of air pollutants at source.
In 2012, the Protocol was amended and two new annexes were added. The Amendments set out in Decision 2012/1/EC entered into force and became effective on the basis of the expedited procedure provided for in the Gothenburg Protocol.
The Amendment contained in Decision 2012/2 is the subject of this Decision.
The Amendment sets out new national emission reduction commitments from 2020 on air pollutants: sulphur, nitrogen oxides, ammonia and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) other than methane and particulate matter.
The Amendment takes a step forward by: (i) incorporating black carbon as a particulate matter component; (ii) updating the emission limit values (emission standards) for different air pollution sources: stationary (e.g. factories and processing plants) and mobile (e.g. vehicles, non-road mobile machines and agricultural and forestry tractors); (iii) introducing new standards on the content of non-methane VOC's in products.
The Union has already adopted instruments on matters covered by the Amendment, including Directives 2001/81/EC on national emission ceilings for certain atmospheric pollutants and (EU) 2015/2193 on the limitation of emissions of certain pollutants into the air from medium combustion plants.
ENTRY INTO FORCE: 17.7.2017.