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Tax on HFCs in France and Denmark

An amendment postpones the entry into force of the tax on HFCs to January 1st, 2023. In Denmark, this tax will increase.

In France, the tax on HFCs will finally not come into force on January 1, 2021.

 

The first debates about this tax began in July 2017, when it appeared in the Climate Plan of the Minister for Ecological and Inclusive Transition at the time. It had been excluded from the 2018 finance bill, but did appeared in the 2019 finance bill, with entry into force scheduled for January 1, 2021. Read the text.

 

On September 28, the finance bill for 2021 was presented. Finally, article 16 of this bill refers to the abolition of unprofitable taxes, and paragraph 27 refers to the repeal of the tax on HFCs.

 

According to the Ministry of Economy and Finance, the abolition of this tax is linked to the fact that due to the F-Gas regulation, professionals in the sector are already fulfilling their commitments.

 

Two amendments [1] [2] were tabled in the days following the presentation of the finance bill to cancel the abolition of the tax. Several deputies believe that the return on this tax, estimated at 390 million euros, could have made it possible to support certain companies in their ecological transition. Other deputies indicate that they do not have tangible elements to judge the commitments made by professionals in the sector.

 

These two amendments were rejected.

 

Anoter amendment was accepted on October 16: it postpones the entry into force of the tax on HFCs to January 1, 2023.

 

Few countries in Europe have adopted a tax on HFCs. This is nevertheless the case in Spain, Norway and Denmark.

 

In Denmark, the tax came into force in 2000. According to the head of the Chemicals Department, within the Ministry of Environment and Food, this tax, combined with other legislative efforts, would have helped save 5.3 million tonnes of CO2-eq emissions.

 

The initial tax was €20 per tonne of CO2-eq. In June 2020, Denmark decided to increase this tax by about 3 or 4 euros, and to remove the €75  cap per kilogram of refrigerant. The revised legislation also introduced a limit of charge of 5000 CO2-eq when installing a new refrigerating equipment.