EU committees vote to water down 2035 CO2 rules for carmakers

Carmakers would only have to cut new-car CO2 emissions by 95 per cent instead of 100 per cent by 2035 under the draft the European Parliament's Industry and Transport Committees approved on Thursday, 22 October. With a green-steel offset worth 7.5 percentage points, the worst-case savings target could fall to 87.5 per cent — leaving the door open for combustion and hybrid registrations well past the de facto 2035 ban.

The vote counts were clear. In the Industry Committee, the result was 49 in favour, 27 against, five abstentions, as Handelsblatt reported. The smaller Transport Committee followed with 27 to 18 and one abstention.

Who backed what?

The draft came out of hard negotiations between the three "Centre Platform" groups: the conservative EPP, the social democratic S&D, and liberal Renew Europe. All their members on the Industry Committee voted yes. Against them stood an unusual coalition: the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists, the right-populist Europe of Sovereign Nations, the far-right Patriots for Europe, plus the Left and the Greens/EFA.

The takeaways in plain words: the centre holds, the flanks object, and the 2035 combustion ban is now negotiable.

How did we get here?

The European Commission answered the auto industry's warnings with its Auto Package at the end of 2025, arguing that holding the line on the 2035 combustion ban would deepen the sector's crisis. Germany applied heavy pressure. The Commission's own proposal set the 2035 fleet target at a 90 per cent reduction versus 2021 — roughly 11 grams of CO2 per kilometre instead of zero — and dropped any date for reaching 100 per cent.

One difference matters. Brussels insists the remaining 10 per cent be fully compensated through green steel and climate-friendly fuels. The Centre Platform's compromise names green steel as a compensation route, but stops short of demanding full compensation back up to the 100 per cent line.

The compromise wasn't automatic. As recently as early October, the Transport Committee postponed its vote — originally set for 5 October — by two and a half weeks because the Centre Platform hadn't finished its internal deal.

What happens next?

Three hurdles remain:

• The Environment Committee votes in early November, per Spiegel.
• The full plenary likely follows in December, needing a simple majority; the EPP is Parliament's largest group.
• The Council then votes, requiring a qualified majority: at least 15 member states representing at least 65 per cent of the EU population.

Changes remain possible at every stage, and interest groups will push amendments during consultation.

Where do Germany and France stand?

Chancellor Friedrich Merz and President Emmanuel Macron have agreed a joint position: 90 per cent CO2 reduction by 2035, with no compensation mechanism at all. Spiegel calls that Franco-German compromise "groundbreaking for the vote in the Council of EU Member States."

France, previously an opponent of weakening the targets, has apparently switched sides — at a price. Germany is reportedly backing the so-called 'Buy European' requirements in return.

Beyond Germany, six other EU states — all with relatively low EV shares in new registrations — had pushed for weaker CO2 targets and combustion-engine survival. The Commission is said to have designed the Auto Package deliberately broad, so as many countries as possible get something out of it.

What to watch: the Environment Committee vote in early November, the December plenary, and whether the Council's qualified-majority arithmetic survives the German-French 90-per-cent-no-offsets line.