EU Looking to Update Intermodal Freight Regulations

The European Commission is proposing an update to its intermodal freight regulations that it hopes will make EU freight movement more efficient, competitive and climate-friendly. The proposal, released last week, would update the EU’s current Combined Transport Directive -- an “outdated” freight transportation regulation last amended in 1992 -- by incentivizing the use of “intermodal operations that contribute the most to making freight transport more sustainable,” the commission said.

As part of the proposal, the EU will look to better combine freight shipped on trucks with “other, more sustainable transport modes” during the life cycle of a freight transport, such as “barges, short sea shipping or trains,” said Adina Vălean, the EU transport commissioner. This will “reduce the external costs of transport and optimise the use of our transport network for the benefit of citizens and our economy."

In a questions and answers document, the EU said truck transport of freight is responsible for most of the “negative externalities” resulting from freight movement, and this “cannot be reduced by decarbonisation, only by reducing the relative share of road transport.” The commission’s proposal will look to “increase the uptake of intermodal transport” by dedicating EU support for “combined transport operations. This would ideally combine the “flexibility” of road transport -- preserved for the first or last leg of a journey -- with the “environmental performance” of rail, inland waterways or short sea shipping.

Transport companies will be able to use a “calculation tool” to “prove whether their operation is eligible for specific combined transport support,” the commission said, adding that “there will be no more issues with different interpretations at national or local level about eligible operations.” The proposal also calls on EU member states to “assess the barriers hindering the uptake of combined transport and ensure that national policy frameworks allow for an overall reduction of at least 10% of the average door-to-door cost of combined transport operations.”

The proposal will next be considered by the European Parliament and the European Council.