12 Ambient air quality
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14335/05
COM(05) 447
+ ADD 1
| Draft Directive on ambient air quality and cleaner air for Europe
Commission Staff Working Paper: Annex to the Commission Communication Thematic Strategy on Air Pollution and the Directive on Ambient Air Quality and Cleaner Air for Europe — Impact Assessment
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| Legal base | Article 175EC; co-decision; QMV
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| Department | Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
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| Basis of consideration | Second SEM of 15 May 2006
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| Previous Committee Report | HC 34-xiv (2005-06), para 3 (11 January 2006) and HC 34-xvi (2005-06), para 7 (25 January 2006)
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| To be discussed in Council | 27 June 2006
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| Committee's assessment | Politically important
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| Committee's decision | Cleared
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Background
12.1 As we first noted in our Report of 11 January 2006, the Commission
has sought in this document to give legislative effect to the
intentions in the Communication it produced in September 2005[42]
setting out a Thematic Strategy on Air Pollution. As such, the
proposal would retain the obligations which Member States are
currently required to meet under the Air Quality Framework Directive
(1996/62/EC) and three of its "daughter" Directives,[43]
but, in addition to allowing them more time to comply, it would
introduce a number of changes foreshadowed in the Thematic Strategy.
These include a non-mandatory provision to reduce ambient levels
of the more hazardous fine particles below 2.5 µm
in diameter (PM2.5) in 2020 by an average of 20% across
each Member State, with the aim of introducing a mandatory reduction
later; a mandatory annual average "concentration cap"
of 25µg
per m3 on such particles by 2010; and the introduction
of new monitoring requirements by the beginning of 2008, in order
to assess compliance.
12.2 We also noted that the Government was preparing
an initial Regulatory Impact Assessment, but that the Commission
had in the meantime concluded that the measures already committed
will cost €65 billion (£5 billion in the UK), but that,
despite the resultant improvement in air quality, the disbenefits
arising from damage to health in 2020 would still be between €189
and 609 billion a year (£15-43 billion in the UK). It also
put the cost of delivering in due course a mandatory reduction
in fine particle levels at about €5 billion a year across
the Community as a whole, but suggested that this would deliver
benefits of €36-119 billion.
12.3 Against this background, and bearing in mind
the intrinsic importance of the subject, we decided to draw these
proposals to the attention of the House, but said that we would
take a final view on them once we had received the Regulatory
Impact Assessment which the Government had said it would be providing.
12.4 In our subsequent Report of 25 January 2006,
we noted that the initial Regulatory Impact Assessment which we
had by then received had sought to assess the implications of
both the draft Directive as it currently stands and (in order
to aid the UK's negotiating position) of a number of possible
changes. We decided in that Report to concentrate on the first
of these approaches, where the Assessment had suggested that:
- since some of the current limits
set for larger particulate matter up to 10 µm
in diameter (PM10) and nitrogen dioxide may not be
met fully as things stand, the extended time limit for compliance
would increase the chances of those limits being met, and also
have an unquantified impact on the additional costs it would otherwise
have been necessary to incur: on the other hand, there would be
an unquantified health disbenefit;
- since the exposure reduction target for fine
particles is not mandatory, this would of itself be unlikely to
create any additional costs for the UK;
- the proposed concentration cap for fine particles
could be met without additional measures; and
- the costs associated with the need for additional
monitoring would be between £1.6 and 2.5 million a year.
12.5 We therefore commented that the more significant
implications that would arise were certain measures going beyond
those in the proposal to be taken, and we noted that, although
any estimates were inevitably somewhat speculative, the Assessment
had suggested that, if additional measures costing around £500
million a year were to be taken, the benefits could be between
£200 and 1,900 million a year. In other words, at the lower
end of this range, the costs would be greater than the benefits,
whilst at the upper end, the opposite would be the case. Accordingly,
we concluded that, although we saw no need at present for further
consideration of this document, it would be prudent to hold it
under scrutiny, and to ask the Minister to inform us if any changes
giving rise to significant additional costs or benefits were made.
Second supplementary Explanatory Memorandum of
15 May 2006
12.6 We have now received from the Minister for Local
Environment, Marine and Animal Welfare at the Department for Environment,
Food and Rural Affairs (Mr Ben Bradshaw) a Second supplementary
Explanatory Memorandum of 15 May 2006, enclosing a revised Regulatory
Impact Assessment. This maintains the original cost and benefit
estimates provided for implementing the proposal as it stands,
the main change being an increase (from £200 million to £900
million) in the lower figure provided for the benefits which would
arise from any additional measures. However, we understand that
it has now become clear from discussion in Brussels that the Council
is unlikely to agree any additional measures, and that the most
probable outcome will be an agreement along the lines of the Commission's
proposal.
Conclusion
12.7 Since we have already established that the
costs and benefits of adopting the proposal are likely to be small,
we are now content to clear the document.
42 (26900) 12735/05; see HC 34-x (2005-06), para 8
(16 November 2005) and HC 34-xvi (2005-06), para 9 (25 January
2006). Back
43
Covering respectively sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, oxides
of nitrogen, particulate matter and lead; benzene and carbon monoxide;
and ozone. Back
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