News item | 19-04-2022 | 16:30
Consciously opting for sustainable mobility and thus fewer greenhouse gases in traffic. With that aim in mind, large employers will be obliged from next year to provide data about their home-work and business traffic of employees. The concrete goal is 1 megaton of CO2 profit by 2030. If organizations are on track, it will stop at reporting. If it doesn’t work out, they will be obliged to travel smarter and more economically from 2025. Because one way or the other, that CO2 gain is necessary to achieve the climate goals.
State Secretary Heijnen (Infrastructure and Water Management) will send the new regulations to the Senate and House of Representatives today.
Key in hands for climate gain
State Secretary Heijnen: “In the coming years, we will make every possible effort to achieve the climate goals. Everyone can do something about this. Choosing to come to work in a sustainable way would be a big step for the climate. This scheme is intended to encourage that. Working from home, using public transport or cycling to work, or using an electric car or scooter are options that employees and employers will hopefully start thinking about more. They hold the key together.”
Collective ceiling at the request of employers themselves
It has been agreed in the Climate Agreement that large organizations of 100 employees or more will be imposed a standard to make their home-work and business traffic cleaner. This agreement has been made concrete in collaboration with various organizations. Employers’ organizations have asked to first assume a collective ceiling, i.e. without a mandatory individual standard, in order to achieve the target of 1 megaton profit. The uncertainties that corona brought with it played an important role in this.
State Secretary Heijnen has agreed to this, on the condition that organizations supply data about their home-work and business traffic in the coming years. This concerns, for example, the number of car kilometers travelled, broken down by type of fuel. If, based on the data provided, it appears that the CO2emissions decrease sufficiently, then an individual standard per company is not necessary. If it doesn’t decrease enough, that standard will still be there. After all, CO2 gains are necessary to achieve the climate goals.
There are approximately 8,000 organizations with 100 or more employees in the Netherlands. In total, more than 60 percent of all employees work there.
Chairman of the employers’ organization VNO-NCW Ingrid Thijssen: “In addition to our commitment to the Anders Reizen coalition and the regional mobility networks, this scheme can also help companies to be more aware of traveling to and for work. It is of course important to us that the registration method of commuting and business kilometers will soon be in line with the existing administration of companies and that the privacy of employees is guaranteed. is becoming† The State Secretary and I also agree on that.”
Take care of privacy
The new rules mean that organizations report annually. When drafting the regulations, respecting the privacy of employees was an important condition. For example, employers are only allowed to report totals for the entire organization. The government also believes it is important that reporting creates as little extra work for employers as possible. That is why data is mainly requested that employers often already have in their administration. They therefore do not have to keep track of or calculate the CO2 emissions themselves. A digital platform will be made available for reporting and calculations.
speed up
This measure is one of the measures taken by the government to reduce CO2 emissions in the Netherlands. Speeding up is necessary to achieve the climate goals, both in the short and longer term. The government wants everything on the road to run completely without exhaust gases by 2050. Depending on how you calculate exactly, traffic is currently responsible for approximately twenty percent of CO2 emissions in the Netherlands.