The European Parliament’s environment committee on Thursday called for the bloc to slash greenhouse gas emissions by 60 percent by 2030 — part of an ongoing political fight over just how deeply the EU should cut.
The committee’s position — which still has to be approved in a vote Friday, and then by the full Parliament next month — is a considerable jump on the current 2030 target of a 40 percent cut. It also goes beyond the “at least 55 percent” that European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to call for next week.
Here’s why Thursday’s vote matters for the bloc’s climate agenda:
1. Tough talks ahead
The 2030 target is part of the committee’s position on the Climate Law, meant to make the EU’s 2050 climate-neutrality objective legally binding.
While a narrow majority of ENVI Committee MEPs backed the 60 percent goal, other committees haven’t gone as far. The industry and energy committee and the transport committee both support a 55 percent cut.
That’s likely to set off a parliamentary brawl ahead of October’s plenary vote.
Whatever Parliament agrees also has to be squared with member countries.
An alliance of largely Northern and Western European countries is keener on a cut of 55 percent, while Central European countries still relying on coal like Poland, Bulgaria and Romania balk at the economic costs of such a step.
But the pressure to settle on a higher target is growing.
German Environment Minister Svenja Schulze, who oversees ministerial negotiations over the Climate Law under the German Council presidency, said Wednesday that there “are very good arguments for an ambitious goal of 55 percent,” adding the current goal “isn’t enough.”
It’s still unclear whether EU leaders will first have to sign off on any higher target, or whether Schulze can muscle through a deal via a qualified majority among ministers only.
2. Conservative skepticism
The 60 percent figure wasn’t backed by European People’s Party MEPs. The center-right group, which makes up the largest force in the Parliament, is skeptical of raising the target to even 55 percent without a detailed assessment — something the Commission is supposed to provide as early as next week.
“If the Commission finally proposes 55 percent CO2 emission cuts by 2030, it will very much depend on how we get there. We want a market economy and as few new rules as possible,” Peter Liese, the EPP’s environmental coordinator, said Thursday.
The European Conservatives and Reformists group also dismissed the idea of higher targets, warning it could have crippling effects on businesses and communities already reeling from the impact of the pandemic.
That echoes July’s stance by the Visegrad 4 grouping of Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, who were joined by and Romania and Bulgaria and called on Green Deal chief Frans Timmermans to clearly spell out the “real social, environmental and economic costs” of higher targets.
3. Higher goals require legislative changes
Even boosting the goal to 55 percent will require major changes to existing energy and climate legislation. It also means broadening climate requirements to sectors like aviation and shipping which until now have successfully avoided being included in such targets.
Brussels is expected to propose legislative changes next June.
It plans to tighten up and possibly expand the Emissions Trading System to road transport and shipping, update renewables and energy efficiency goals and policies ranging from the circular economy to agriculture and industrial policy in an effort to speed up EU emissions reductions.
Expanding the ETS is favored by Germany, but the Commission is skeptical and the idea has lots of opposition in Parliament.
The need to set higher emissions reduction targets for member countries will also set off a political fight. Many countries don’t want their national targets to be simply expanded to hit the higher targets, so EU members will battle over how any increase should be fairly apportioned.
Reaching higher targets will also require massive investment. While EU leaders in July agreed to earmark 30 percent of the next EU budget for climate efforts, analysts say even more is needed.
4. What does it mean for climate change?
A 55 percent target, let alone a 60 percent one, is a steep political hill to climb, but climate campaigners warn it’s not enough to tackle global warming.
“This is a step forward in the fight against climate change, but policy makers have not gone far enough,” said Barbara Mariani, senior policy officer for climate at the European Environmental Bureau, an NGO, in a statement.
Jytte Guteland, an MEP with the Socialists & Democrats, wanted the committee to back a 65 percent emissions cut, but she failed to get the needed support. That’s the level of cuts that activists say would meet the Paris Agreement’s aspirational target of limiting global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees.
“We call on the European Parliament in plenary to at least back the agreed target of 60% and preferably go for a 65% emission reduction target for 2030 to be in line with the Paris Agreement and the latest available science,” said Wendel Trio, director of Climate Action Network Europe, in a statement after the vote.
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