EU Council note on F-gas and ODS proposals (GEN – 1451.00)
GEN – 1451.00. The European Council recently published an Information from the Presidency on the state of play of two current legislative proposals: Regulation on Fluorinated Greenhouse gases, and Regulation on substances that deplete the ozone layer.
The European Council recently published an Information from the Presidency on the state of play of two current legislative proposals:
- Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on fluorinated Greenhouse gases, amending Directive (EU) 2019/1937 and repealing Regulation (EU) No 517/2014
- Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on substances that deplete the ozone layer and repealing Regulation (EC) No 1005/2009
The aim of the report is to provide an overview of the progress made on the proposals, in the introduction is stated that a review of the regulation on fluorinated greenhouse gases is particularly relevant to update the current rules to ensure compliance with the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, especially beyond 2030.
Work in the Council
The Commission published the proposals for the revised Regulations on 5 April 2022 and presented them to the Working Party on the Environment in May and to the Council (Environment) in June. The examination of the proposals started under the French Presidency and continued under the Czech Presidency, during which eight meetings of the Working Party on the Environment were dedicated to these two proposals.
Priority has been given to the F-gas proposal since the ozone depleting substances have generally been phased out already.
Moreover, the quota system in the F-gas Regulation has a triennial cycle, with a new cycle starting on 1 January 2024, and it would be highly preferable if the F-gas proposal could enter into force in 2023 and become applicable on 1 January 2024
Regulation on fluorinated greenhouse gases
Many Member States expressed support for the idea of extending the subject matter of the Regulation to include natural refrigerants, the discussion also showed that while the proposed timeline for the phase-down of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) is considered too ambitions by several Member States, a larger group of Member States is against lowering the overall level of ambition of the Commission’s proposal.
Further discussion will be necessary on other key elements of the proposal, such as the timeline for restrictions on the placing on the market of certain products and equipment and the introduction and level of a price for quotas for HFCs.
Recommended actions
Interested Members are invited to carefully assess the document and follow the discussion within the Task Force FGAS, which will meet again on 11 January 2023.
Related documents and links
All related documents and articles can be found in the respective sections in the right sidebar.
- GEN – 1451.01 – Information from the Presidency of EU Council on the state of play
- GEN – 1447.00 – ENVI and ITRE amendments on F-Gas Regulation.pdf
- GEN – 1433.00 – Draft Report of the EP ENVI Committee on the F-Gas Review
- GEN – 1425.00 – Draft opinion of the EP ITRE Committee on the F-Gas Review
- GEN – 1368.00 – Development HFC prices Q4-2021
- GEN – 1273.00 – Development HFC prices Q1-2021
- GEN – 1197.00 – Development of HFC prices Q3-2020
- GEN – 1194.00 – Report from the European Commission on the availability of HFCs
- GEN – 1173.00 – F-Gas quota and reporting, Ozone Depleting Substances
- GEN – 1163.00 – Development of HFC Prices
- GEN – 1160.00 – F-Gas review consultation
- GEN – 1120.00 – Development of HFC prices Q1-2020
- GEN – 1083.00 – Development of HFC prices Q3-2019
- GEN – 1064.00 – Development of HFC prices Q2-2019
- GEN – 1057.00 – Price evolutions refrigerants and French carbon tax
- GEN – 1043.00 – Development of HFC prices
- GEN – 969.00 – F-Gas industry roundtable
- GEN – 958.00 – F-Gas recent publications
- GEN – 896.00 – Öko-Recherche – Monitoring survey on refrigerant prices
- GEN – 890.00 – F-Gas Regulation Consultation Forum 6 March 2018