Bulgaria: What Will Change after Eco-Stickers for Vehicles Are Mandated

Since September last year, the Ordinance on annual technical inspections of road vehicles has an addendum, which must enter into force from July 2021.

A mandatory sticker on the windshield will indicate which eco-group the given car will belong to, it shows how environmentally friendly the vehicle is). How will these groups be determined, what will this mean for car owners and how will they be tracked? Damian Voynovski, Deputy Chairman of the Executive Agency "Automotive Administration" commented on the topic in "Our Day" radio talk show.

Eco-groups

"For the definition of the eco-groups we have provided - once the environmental category of the vehicle will be taken into account, if it does not have a category - it will be the date of initial registration. And a second time the measurement made during the technical examination itself. Depending on these two factors, the environmental category of the vehicle will be determined.'

"In any case, the exhaust gases will be measured. Depending on the environmental category, producers will set standards which are to be complied with during the technical examination. First we check that these standards are not below the thresholds specified by the manufacturer, second, if they are better than those admitted, we the vehicle passes into a higher environmental category.

The same applies to cars that are equipped with liquefied petroleum gas system, they will go into a higher category if the exhaust gas check shows better results than the vehicle needs to show."

"We have divided them into five categories, as the fifth category is reserved for electric cars that do not emit exhaust gases. The rest are already given according to the eco-category and the readings of the vehicle...