Industry News
Dutch and Portuguese governments launch eco-car registration tax schemes
20th July 2006
The Netherlands and Portugal have this month introduced differentiations into their car registration taxes to encourage car buyers to opt for low-emissions models, reports T&E, the European environmental transport NGO’s newsletter.
In the Netherlands, the new registration taxes, payable when a car is sold to its first buyer, can earn the owner of a hybrid a discount up to €6000. Conventional cars are divided into seven categories (A-G), with the lowest CO2-emissions cars bringing buyers a registration tax discount of €1000; the highest CO2-emitting cars now cost their owners €540 more than they paid up to 30 June this year. The seven classes are based on fuel consumption, CO2 emissions and an efficiency indicator relative to other cars of a similar size.
In Portugal, the new rules mean 10% of a car’s registration tax is differentiated according to CO2 emissions in four classes, with hybrid vehicles earning their owners a 40% reduction.
Both the Dutch and Portuguese systems give hybrids preferential treatment; T&E favours, like Ford, whose European executive vice president Lewis Booth gave a speech yesterday on the subject at the London Motor Show, a technology-neutral approach rewarding good CO2 emissions performance rather one than favouring specific technologies.
(T&E Bulletin, 19 July -www.transportenvironment.org/docs/Bulletin/2006/2006-07_bulletin150_web.pdf
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