Air pollution: ozone in ambient air, emission ceilings

On 13 June 2001 the European Parliament adopted 17 amendments. 3 amendments have been accepted by the Commission in full, 10 have been accepted in part or in principle. The remaining 4 amendments cannot be accepted. With regard to the amendments accepted by the Commission, these relate to: - maintaining air quality where it is good save when this is not possible due to transboundary pollution or meteorological conditions; - making it binding for Member States to consider examples of measures given in a guidance report to be adopted by a Committee; - requiring Member States to pay special attention to the effects of ozone on the environment and on human health. The Commission considers this as a useful supplement. The amendments accepted in principle by the Commission concern: - Member States having to report on short-term action plans. As reporting to the Commission is already covered by Article 10 (2) (iii) (c) the amendment should only mention reporting to the public etc. and could only be accepted in principle in its current wording. - ensuring consistency with the Directive on National Emission Ceilings; - the amendments addressing the attainment of the target values and the long-term objectives. They propose to replace the term "as far as possible" by "save where physically impossible" thereby making the requirement for attainment more binding. The Commission could agree on this, however feels it necessary to complement this wording by "or not cost effective". Lastly, the amendments not accepted by the Commission relate to: - the amendments which address accession candidate countries. These are not appropriate for an EU Directive; - the amendment requiring Member States to report also on target values. However, this is already covered, as the numeric value of the target value is identical to the long-term objective. With regard to the nature of the long-term objective the proposed reference to the protection of vegetation could not imply reporting to single exceedences but on an annually integrated value. Though this could be agreed in general the amendment would need a substantial rewording; - the transboundary nature of ozone.�