Slow down: Dutch cut max speed limit to rein in pollution

HAGUE, Nerlands (AP) — Dutch government is lowering top speed limit on highways in a bid to put brakes on emissions of pollutant nitrogen oxide.

Prime Minister Mark Rutte anunced Wednesday that maximum speed limit will be cut from 130 kilometers per hour to 100 km/h (81-62 miles per hour) on many of country’s highways.

It was a climbdown for Rutte, whose conservative party is kwn as “vroom vroom” party because of its support of motorists.

Rutte says he is “unbelievably unhappy that 130 is disappearing.”

measure follows a Dutch Supreme Court decision in May that said government’s rules for granting permits to projects that emit nitrogen oxide breach European Union environmental law.

That led to a freeze on permits for many construction projects.