Schultz Environment Blog

Environment in a broad sense,transports and energy issues. From my local point of view with a global touch!

Friday, June 29, 2007

Agreement between Sweden and the US
Sweden and the US signed an agreement yesterday about cooperation in the field of sustainable development yesterday. The Swedish Minister for Enterprises and Energy, Deputy Prime Minister Maud Olofsson and Alexander Karsner, Deputy Minister of Energy were the signers and what the deal really is about is not that obvious. The only concrete thing in this stage is that Volvo is engage in using 125 million SEK to invent new technique in heavy trucks with less emissions. Otherwise, its more of a declaration to work together with the market to create sustainable development, I think. It gives both countries some credit for taking action without that much of concrete content? Or, have I missed some important issue from the press conference?

Thursday, June 28, 2007


New meeting for the Ministers of Environment in the European Union

Today the Ministers of Environment meets in Luxemburg to discuss the emissions of carbon dioxide from cars among other items. I have written about the proposal from the Commission about this before, the 7: Th of February this year. The commission wants to lower the limit values of greenhouse gases to 130 gram per kilometer by 2012. And through other measures, better fuels and tires, the commission hopes to reach 120 gram per kilometer by 2012. The Swedish government supports this proposal and probably the Ministers will agree upon this today.
Then we will see how the nations will implement this in their measures back home.
Today the Swedish Energy Agency and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency suggests radical higher tax on gasoline and diesel with 0,75 SEK and to increase the tax on the vehicles for those who drives vehicles that have high emissions. We will see what the government will say about this.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Achieving the Swedish environmental objectives won’t be easy!
The Swedish Environmental Objectives Council released the report in Stockholm, 7 June 2007. Half of the sixteen objectives are judged to be hard to meet on time, before 2020. When I compared the report with the report for 2005 there were only four objectives in that category in 2005. The follow up is perhaps a bit more critical to the achievements this time. More measures are needed and also more international action, it says. This year's report from the Council focuses on action at the international level. These days the Swedish minister for Environment is hosting a meeting for about 30 environmental ministers from all around the world in “The Midnight Sun Dialogue on Climate Change” up in far north of Sweden. It is the third meeting in a series of meetings between the ministers. They will discuss a future program for the climate changes, after the Kyoto protocol.

An English version of the Council's report, Sweden 's environmental objectives – in an interdependent world, de Facto 2007, ISBN 91-620-1260-6, will be available at the end of June from the
Swedish Environmental Protection Agency's online bookstore.