After three years of processing, the Sustainable Mobility Law has passed to the Senate. There have been hundreds of allegations presented by political parties and third sector organizations and their approval means complying with the commitments made by Spain with Brussels and the arrival of 10,000 million euros of European funds. The law establishes, for the first time, the objective of decarbonizing transportation, a sector that is considered the main responsible for Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. According to data from the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, road transport alone is responsible for 32.1% of the total of these emissions.
The Law directly targets private vehicles and short-range flights and promises more trains, improvements in public transportation and encouraging the use of bicycles. Additionally, it includes the concept of transportation poverty. «The recognition of right to mobility, talk about multimodality, energy efficiency or poverty in transport They have achieved great consensus. The topic of poverty is interesting because it is not focused only on income. A middle-class person can be vulnerable in terms of transportation, depending on where they live, what mobility services they have, what the distance is to their work or whether they have a vehicle,” comments Cristian Quilez, head of Transportation at the Ecology and Development Foundation (Ecodes).
Celebrating that Spain has a Law on Sustainable Mobility and a roadmap of where it wants to go, that is, cleaner transportation, does not mean that there are no loose ends to be tied and that in the small print on how to follow the path there is no divergence of opinions.
Without a doubt, one of the issues that generates the most doubts is the change in the environmental labels created by the General Directorate of Traffic in 2016 and that “at first glance they have been obsolete for years. In 2021, in fact, they should have been updated, but we know that there was a report –although we know little else about it–, due to which it was paralyzed. The label system deceives the consumer because it puts a nomenclature on vehicles that do not correspond to said nomenclature in terms of emissions. The “Zero” label includes plug-in hybrid vehicles that run on a gasoline engine most of the time and whose electrical power is minimal. There are studies that conclude that they pollute the same as gasoline. For its part, the “Eco” label has been used a bit as a disaster box for gas cars, hybrids, and includes some new diesel and gasoline cars. However, cars that use gas have few NOx and microparticle emissions but have many CO2 emissions,” says Quilez. A report published this week by the Transport and Environment organization states that Plug-in hybrid electric vehicles emit only 19% less CO2 than gasoline and diesel cars. “In laboratory tests, they were assumed to be 75% less polluting,” the analysis says.
The new labels will include stricter criteria with actual CO2 emissions of each type of vehicle and it is certain that plug-in hybrids with less than 90 km of electric range will be removed from the Zero label, which will become Eco. «In France last year a system was launched that assesses the entire life cycle, that is, the emissions that the vehicle has generated from its production to its circulation. It is also a way to penalize Chinese vehicles, manufactured with very minimal environmental regulations. In Europe they are looking for a unified system,” says Quilez.
Although the Spanish law will not have retroactive applications, that is, vehicles already registered will not change their sticker, the fear that this change of labels will mean more restrictions on circulation is present among consumers. At least that’s what they say from the Spanish Consumer Association, an organization born in 2022, which considers that “with the limitations of access through Low Emission Zones are already creating quite a problem, among other things, due to the disparity in criteria between some cities. and others. “Consumers complain that they have to be constantly aware of signs and prohibitions more than driving itself and they are concerned about possible new tightening of vehicle access to cities with the change that is intended to be made to the badges,” says its president, Miguel Ángel Ruiz. The spokesperson also shows consumers’ reluctance to force the change towards electric mobility. «Electric ones are much more expensive and the economic situation is not good either. The clean transportation objectives of the Law are very good, but the issues must be addressed from below and sufficient infrastructure must first be created. If that exists, the citizen is going to bet on efficient and public transportation beyond the law, especially if it is interventionist and harms the mobility interests of consumers,” says Miguel Ángel Ruiz. The law also establishes measures to expand the charging infrastructure that now has 48,000 active points when it should have 91,000 in 2025 according to the objectives already established. In addition, another 14,600 are inactive according to data from the Spanish Association of Automobile and Truck Manufacturers.
Goodbye to short flights
The Law promotes the elimination of domestic flights with a rail alternative of up to 2.5 hours and recover the routes of night trains, which curiously were eliminated only five years ago in the midst of the Covid crisis due to lack of profitability. The intention is that but as of today «Renfe does not have specific investment plans in any of these routes. We continue to bet on the AVE. It was not just an economic issue, what they also alleged was that these trains in some areas run on high-speed lines and are used for maintenance at night. The lag with respect to central Europe is clear. “These routes are being encouraged on the continent as an alternative to the plane,” they say from Ecodes. From the Spanish Consumer Association they insist: «the Law is designed for Madrid and Barcelona, but it does not work the same for other provinces. I live in Almería, eliminating the direct flight means making the journey in a minimum of six hours and with several changes of means. Betting today only on rail services is complicated, because right now it is the worst valued by consumers due to its continuous delays and cancellations. This week we saw it with a train derailment in Madrid and the consumer sees all of this as an obstacle,” he says. We must not forget that this week the Minister of Transport stated that train incidents will be common for at least the next two years.
Regarding the transport of goods, which we also want to promote, “the objective is to reach 10%, when we are around 2.7% and Europe on average is between 12 and 20%. Reaching that 10% would be a record,” says Quilez.
Share a car with colleagues
A CC OO study says that of the trips to work, about 19 million each day, 62.1% are made by car. The Law directs part of its effort there and will force companies with more than 200 employees to have mobility plans. “We are talking, for example, about shared mobility in companies or industrial estates, we are talking about establishing charging points for electric vehicles at the company headquarters, about bonuses for those who can ride a bicycle,” they detail from Ecodes. In the event that public transport is promoted, the possibility is incorporated for workers to deduct the cost of transport cards from personal income tax. Miguel Ángel Ruiz comments that one of the complaints that reaches the association the most has to do once again with obligation. «People wonder why they have to share a car or why there are lanes reserved for vehicles with more than one occupant. “It is a limit to your freedom to move.”