EU Climate Change Policy: From Rhetoric to Reality
Es gilt das gesprochene Wort.
The Year 2007 will be remembered - from the perspective of the European Parliament - as the year of the years for our promises how to fight global warming. In Bali, in winter 2007, the representatives of the EU and from some of the big influential member states made quite clear where we should go:
The target to limit global warming to 2°C compared with pre industrial levels has been adopted by the EU. According to IPCC that implies that industrialised nations will have to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 25-40% in 2020, followed by reductions beyond 80% before 2050. On top of this developing countries have to deviate substantially from their business as usual emissions. Off-setting any part of the EU emission reduction target is therefore inconsistent with the 2°C goal. As the developed countries have produced the emissions which have caused climate change, Europe must support developing countries with additional finance to help them mitigate their emissions and to adapt to the changing climate.
Already in spring 2007, half a year before the Bali summit, the EU-Council had made decisions on Europe's climate and energy goals. At first I was shy in criticising, but from today's perspective I would say that the Council was setting out for a big leap, but was aiming for the wrong target.
• 20% emissions cut until 2020 (30% in the frame of an international agreement)
• 20% renewable energies until 2020
• 20% increased energy efficiency until 2020 (non-binding)
This is not enough to reach the 2°C target:
• Developed countries must make emission cuts of at least 30% by 2020. The legislation should be based on this target. That would also send a strong signal to the international climate negotiations, showing EU leadership.
• To decrease CO2 emissions better energy efficiency as well as energy savings are crucial thus also the efficiency target needs to be binding.
In January 2008 the Commission presented proposals for a regulatory response to achieve the Council's targets without stepping on too many toes:
Emissions trading
• The proposal only aims for a 20% CO2 reduction until 2020 though it includes an automatic adjustment of the target if an international agreement is achieved.
• This already weak target is further watered down by allowing a large part of the emission cuts to be achieved by carbon offsets amounting to 45% of the reduction effort. When carbon credits from outside Europe are taken into account, the cuts required by Europe are significantly lower than the Commission's proposal suggests.
Renewables directive
This is the bright side of the package. But:
• The renewables target does include a 10% target for agrofuels. Agrofuels have proven not only to have a questionable CO2 balance, but also to compete with food and feed production, lead to deforestation, increased emissions through land use change and displacement of small farmers in developing countries.
CO2 and cars
The commission proposes weaker targets than agreed already in the voluntary agreement which has been signed between automotive industry and EU already in 1997. This shows the velocity of political process.
• The Commission weakened the original target of achieving 120g CO2/km as a fleet average by technical means in 2012, by allowing for 10g CO2 reductions to be achieved by so called additional measures.
• As a parameter for differentiation for the different models weight was chosen. This does not give an incentive to produce smaller and lighter cars and might even create the perverse incentive to increase car weight.
{img |size=001 |align=right}Then the Parliament started negotiating the package. A lot of heated discussions in the committees and within and between the different political groups were necessary before the votes in the committee of the environment. Here the members of the parliament that are truly committed to the fight against climate change were able to drag along those who were ready to walk away from the target
Emissions trading
Maintaining the Commission proposal was a big fight as the industry lobby pushed for significant weakening especially on the allocation methods (free allocation vs auctioning). The outcome did however keep auctioning as a general principle and introduced some important improvements:
• 100% of the auctioning revenues shall be earmarked for climate purposes.
• Quality criteria for external offsets have been introduced.
Renewable directive
The Commissions proposal was considerably strengthened:
• Binding Interim targets and a penalty system were introduced
• Priority grid access for renewables was granted. This ensures the maximum proportion of clean, renewable energy will be used.
• Renewable energy obligations for new and existing buildings are introduced.
• The National support systems were protected
• Unfortunately there was no majority to delete the 10% target for renewables in transport. However electric cars, fuelled with renewable electricity can also count towards the target. Also sustainability criteria for agrofuels have been considerably strengthened.
CO2 and cars
As in the ETS negotiations also here most efforts had to be made to prevent a considerable weakening of the Commission proposal instead of strengthening it. The ENVI vote outcome however only introduces some weakening:
• Super credits are given to low emission cars thus falsifying the overall target.
• The exemptions for small car manufacturers have been widened.
On the other hand Parliament strengthened the Commission proposal by
• introducing a long term target of 95 g CO2/km as a fleet average in 2020.
At this very moment I am not able to predict what will be the outcome of Brussels famous trialogues between Council, Commission and Parliament. There are strong national interests involved in all of these legislations, so the negotiations will certainly not be easy.
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Hintergrund zum EU-Klimapaket (auf Englisch): Weitere Konferenz-Materialien: WPF Venice - Final Press Release |
