BERLIN (Dow Jones) – According to Welt am Sonntag (WamS), the Lühmann Group, which is active in trading synthetic fuels, wants to be the first German company to sue against parts of the EU regulation banning internal combustion engines. The regulation stipulates that newly registered cars must be emission-free from 2035. It sounds “nice to only allow emission-free cars,” Lühmann boss Lorenz Kiene told the newspaper. However, the plan is “driven by ideology, not facts.”
The problem for e-fuel producers, according to WamS, is that their fuels are only climate-neutral in the overall calculation, but produce exhaust gases at the exhaust that are considered dirty by Brussels. The industry therefore believes that no car manufacturer will build e-fuel combustion engines. Not even if Brussels allows approval, as Minister Wissing demands. Because such models could ruin the carbon footprint of car companies.
“It makes no sense to only measure emissions from the exhaust,” says Kiene. For electric cars, for example, the origin of the electricity must also be taken into account. “In Germany it often comes from coal-fired power plants… And then in distant parts of the world nature is destroyed in order to mine the lithium for the batteries.”
DJG/gos
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
September 24, 2023 04:23 ET (08:23 GMT)