Mandatory low emission zones in major cities by 2025

• This Wednesday, at the end of a new National Air Council, Barbara Pompili announced three measures to strengthen and accelerate the deployment in French agglomerations of Low Emission Zones (ZFE).
• This tool, the main tool the government relies on to reduce air pollution, allows cities to limit access to their territory to the most polluting vehicles.
• Four EPZs have already been created and seven should follow in 2021. But by 2025, these EPZs must also be created in 35 other French agglomerations. Those of more than 150,000 inhabitants.

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In recent years, France has been regularly called to order by Brussels for and by the Council of State * for non-compliance with European standards on concentrations in the air in
nitrogen oxide and the
fine particles PM10. For these two pollutants, considered to be the cause of 48,0000 premature deaths in France, each year,
according to Public Health France, the exposure threshold defined by the European Union is
of 40 ug / m3 per day on annual average.

However, these thresholds are regularly exceeded in several French agglomerations. To get in the nails, the government targets road traffic, “responsible for 30% of direct emissions of fine particles and 60% of nitrogen oxide emissions,” said the Minister of Transition ecological.

Three measures to strengthen Low Emission Zones

The main tool used is that Low Emission Zones (ZFE). It allows agglomerations to limit access to their territory to the most polluting vehicles, by prohibiting them from driving on specific niches that these communities define themselves.

Four EPZs have already been created in Paris, in the metropolis of Greater Paris (80 municipalities concerned), that of Grenoble and that of Lyon. The mobility orientation law, by a decree of September 16, made the creation of ZFEs compulsory in
seven other metropolises (Aix-Marseille, Montpellie, Nice, Rouen, Strasbourg, Toulon, Toulouse). They should be operational during 2021.

This Thursday, at the end of a new National Air Council, Barbara Pompili, Minister for the Ecological Transition, announced three measures which aim to accelerate the deployment of these EPZs and to strengthen them.

The state will take control there in case of insufficient improvements

For these eleven first EPZs [les quatre déjà créees + les sept à venir], the State will regulate vehicle traffic restrictions for criteria stickers 5, 4 and 3 from 2023. In other words, vehicles registered before January 1, 2006 for “gasoline” and before January 1, 2011 for ” diesel “. These categories represent around a third of the fleet.

What does it mean ? “If the air quality limit values ​​are not reached in some of the eleven metropolitan areas, then a national calendar will apply for them from 2023 gradually prohibiting the circulation of stickers 5, 4 and 3,” indicates- do we at the Ministry of Ecological Transition. Of course, the local authorities concerned will remain free to set stricter rules than those envisaged by the State according to their local specificities. “

Among these eleven agglomerations, the Ministry of Ecological Transition expects Lyon, Marseille and Paris to still exceed the air quality limit values ​​in 2023, “given their urban density”, specifies -on in the entourage of Barbara Pompili.

These Crit’air 5, 4 and 3 vehicles represent around a third of the fleet. Will they be completely banned from circulation in 2023 in the territories still outside the limit values ​​or only at specific times of the week? [la semaine mais pas le week-end par exemple]? “This point has not yet been decided,” says one in the entourage of Barbara Pompili. Discussions are still ongoing as to whether the details of the traffic restrictions will be defined at the national level or at the discretion of communities. “

Mandatory EPZs in 35 agglomerations in 2025

At the same time – and this is the second measure announced by Barbara Pompili this Wednesday – the State will extend the EPZ system by making it compulsory in all agglomerations with more than 150,000 inhabitants from 2025. Thirty-five new agglomerations will then be affected. “It will be up to these communities to define the perimeter of these zones and the restriction rules,” indicates the Ministry of Ecological Transition.
With this enlargement, the government says it wants to anticipate a tightening of air quality standards at European level. “We expect these to align with even more stringent WHO recommendations [Organisation mondiale de la santé], we explain to the Hotel Roquelaure. If nothing is done, these 35 agglomerations of more than 150,000 inhabitants will find themselves in a situation of exceeding the limit values. “

Facilitate the creation of future EPZs

Finally, the third measure aims to facilitate the creation of these EPZs. These apply at the scale of metropolises which themselves group together several municipalities. “To date, each mayor within the metropolis concerned must take a decree to create this EPZ on the land of his municipality, we recall in the entourage of Barbara Pompili. It is thus necessary that 80 decrees are taken so that the ZFE on the scale of Greater Paris can be effective. From now on, it will be a competence of the president of the intercommunality, that is to say the president of an urban community, of a community of agglomeration or of a president of metropolis. This will make it possible to simplify the administrative process but also to have the guarantee that we will have homogeneous traffic measures on the scale of each agglomeration. “

It remains to be seen what controls are planned in these Low Emission Zones. On this subject, the Ministry of Ecological Transition indicates that the government is working on an automated “control / sanction” system. “Concretely, it will be automatic radars like those already on the side of the road for measuring speeding, explains one in the entourage of the Minister. They will allow you to read the vehicle’s license plate, deduce its Crit’air sticker and then know whether or not it is authorized to drive. These radars are still under development. “The objective is to have an operational mechanism by the end of the five-year term, so that we can as quickly as possible ensure compliance with the rules in the existing EPZs.”