9 October 2026 – DiversifyEU: Brussels’ central planning is entering the next round. The Commission now wants to steer supply chains with tariffs. Klingbeil’s double charge: the German state collects CO2 costs from trucks twice, at the pump and through road tolls.
Klingbeil’s Double Charge: Germany Collects CO2 From Trucks Twice
The CO2 cost of a truck journey has almost increased tenfold since 2021. The Finance Minister, however, is not thinking about relief. He is thinking about his budget.
Eight hundred kilometres from Munich to Hamburg, 256 litres of diesel, one heavy articulated truck. In 2021, the journey incurred €17.15 in CO2 charges. In 2026, it is €171. Once again, just as with the cost increases caused by the CBAM and steel quotas: a factor of 10!
One Tonne, Two Cash Registers
The CO2 price on diesel rose from €25 to €65 per tonne. Since December 2023, a CO2 surcharge has also been added to the road toll, calculated at €200 per tonne. The same tonne therefore costs around €249: €65 at the pump and €184 at the toll gantry.
The Treasurer Is Reviewing
The previous coalition promised to prevent double charging and introduced it anyway. According to its coalition agreement, the CDU-SPD government merely wants to “review” multiple burdens. Klingbeil appears primarily interested in reviewing how he can keep the money.
In 2027, he plans to transfer €2.7 billion from European emissions trading directly into the core federal budget, bypassing the Climate Fund. In that fund, administered by his ministry, support for commercial vehicles with alternative drivetrains is being cut from €296 million to €150 million. First collect the money, then cut the alternative.
In 2024, the federal government collected €12.96 billion in road tolls, 75 per cent more than in 2023, helped by the extension to trucks above 3.5 tonnes. €5.95 billion of that did not go back into roads, but into rail.
Inflation by Truck
Destatis recorded producer prices in road freight transport 6.9 per cent higher in the third quarter of 2024 and identified the toll increase as a driver. Hardly any product reaches its destination without a truck. The amendment to the Fuel Emissions Trading Act, BEHG, raises the additional purchase price to €75 in 2027. On double charging, it remains silent.
Charged, Not Steered
By mid-2025, around 1,800 of more than 800,000 toll-liable heavy trucks were zero emission. Anyone who has no alternative is not being steered. They are simply being charged.
Mr Klingbeil: one tonne, one price. Credit the toll surcharge against the BEHG price or abolish it. Anything else is a transport tax with a green label.
DiversifyEU: Brussels Wants to Steer Supply Chains Through Tariffs
Ten working days for the Steel Regulation, now four weeks for an instrument intended to determine where Europe buys from.
The Next Deadline Is Already Running
Since last week, the Commission has been collecting feedback on DiversifyEU, a new trade instrument intended to diversify supply chains. The deadline is 27 October, once again breaching the Commission’s own minimum consultation period of eight weeks.
Brussels Wants to Steer the Market Again
The idea that politicians and technocrats in Brussels should once again think on behalf of the market is economic nonsense. That should be obvious. The Commission complains that appropriate price signals are missing. The market sends them every day. Socialist Brussels simply does not like them.
The new signals are instead supposed to come from tariffs under Article 31 TFEU, aggregated demand and subsidies. Once again, there is no impact assessment, yet the proposal is still supposed to arrive before the end of the year. As with steel, urgency is apparently the justification.
Semi-Finished Steel as a Case Study for DiversifyEU
It will be interesting to see how steelmakers that import their own input material position themselves. In 2025, the EU imported more than ten million tonnes of semi-finished steel. For slabs and billets, 42 per cent came from Russia. Together with China, the figure was 58 per cent. Two thirds of stainless steel semi-finished products came from Indonesia.
How Brussels intends to impose diversification in precisely this area should provide a case study for all of us.
DiversifyEU: A Hint of a Level Playing Field?
In principle, DiversifyEU could even create somewhat fairer competitive conditions.
Import traders are naturally far more diversified than large industry, whatever the product. And the demand Brussels now wants to aggregate has been aggregated by traders for decades, across numerous mills and countries, without any platform from Brussels.
Anyone who seriously measures dependency should therefore start with the large corporations.
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