The EU executive announced a comprehensive proposal to solve the global heating problem and warned that in the fight against climate and natural crises, “decades of success or failure”.
More than a dozen draft laws covering stricter industrial pollution control, higher renewable energy targets, and a goal of planting 3 billion trees, aim to ensure that the EU reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 1990 levels by 55 %.
The huge legislative package must be approved by EU ministers and members of the European Parliament and published as Huge wildfire rages in SiberiaAnd California’s Death Valley documented what could happen The highest temperature reliably recorded on the earth.
The EU has pledged to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, and achieving the interim goal is essential to stay on track.
Frans Timmermans European Commission The Vice President in charge of the EU Green Agreement said: “This is a decade of success or failure in tackling the climate and biodiversity crisis.
“Yes, it is difficult, yes, it is difficult. But it is also an obligation, because if we give up our obligation to help humans live within the boundaries of the earth, we will fail not only ourselves, but also our children and grandchildren. In my opinion, if we do not solve this problem, we will fight for water and food.”
The European Union, rooted in the European Coal and Steel Community, has shaped itself as a global champion of climate action and hopes that other countries can take the lead. The UN COP26 international climate negotiations held in Glasgow in November this year.
Carbon pricing is a red line running through the proposal. Ursula von DelaneThe President of the European Commission stated that CO2 Emissions must have a price, “to encourage consumers, producers and innovators to choose clean technologies.” She promised CO2 The pricing will be accompanied by social compensation to help those who need it the most to pay for greener transportation and energy efficiency upgrades to houses.
Brussels also hopes to effectively eliminate internal combustion engines from the car production line, and the goal is to achieve zero emissions in all new cars by 2035.
One of the most controversial ideas is to impose taxes on polluting imported products such as steel, aluminum and fertilizers. The proposed “carbon border adjustment mechanism” will mean that foreign companies pay to sell polluting products to the EU-this is to protect European companies from weakened by weakly regulated competitors.EU officials believe they can avoid WTO Because, they say, European companies are equally bound.
Under the EU’s emissions trading system, industrial plants within the EU will face stricter emission restrictions, and free allowances will be phased out in 2030 or later.
This Emissions Trading Scheme Started in 2005. It allows power generators and heavy industries to purchase pollutant emission permits (quotas), but the number is steadily decreasing; there is a general upper limit, which is reduced year by year.
Officials say the plan has reduced emissions from these sectors by 43%. They now hope to use equivalent free market programs to reduce emissions from other sectors.
But even before the release of the new plan for the transportation and construction sectors, this idea was met with opposition.Pascal Canfin, Chairman of the Environmental Committee of the European Parliament, said The EU’s establishment of an emissions trading plan for buildings and road transport is a “political suicide”.
The committee hopes that fuel suppliers for buildings and vehicles will purchase pollution permits from 2025, because it believes that price signals will reduce emissions more effectively than setting standards alone.
Activists have long warned that the total control and trading system of these industries may lead to soaring consumer energy bills, exacerbating energy poverty and public protests. These industries together account for more than half of EU emissions. The committee stated that this result is avoidable given that its proposed social climate fund allocates 72.2 billion euros (61.4 billion pounds) from the EU budget in seven years.
The Social Climate Fund will be used to improve household energy efficiency and help drivers switch to “green” vehicles. Governments will be required to pay fees to the fund and organize these programs. “This is not an EU cash machine,” a senior EU official said.
Also proposed:
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By 2030, 3 billion trees will be planted across the EU to better protect some of the oldest forests in Europe.
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By 2030, 40% of the EU’s energy will come from renewable sources, which is an improvement from the current 32% target.
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The EU member states will receive a binding target for improving energy efficiency, with the goal of renovating 3% of public buildings each year.
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The reduction in emissions of new cars — 55% by 2030 and 100% by 2035 — means the end of gasoline and diesel-powered vehicles.
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The government is required to speed up the installation of charging and refueling facilities for non-fossil fuel vehicles. The goal is to set up a charging station every 60 kilometers on EU roads and a hydrogen refueling point every 150 kilometers.
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Ships of more than 5,000 tons docked in EU ports need to purchase pollution permits based on the emission system. Airlines that have been trading emissions in the European Economic Area since 2012 will lose their free allowances by 2027.
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Fuel suppliers at airports and ports will be required to use “sustainable” fuels.
Legislators hope to reach agreement on the law quickly in 2022 and warn that the delay will jeopardize the achievement of the end of the decade goal.
“It is generally agreed that we need to act quickly in a climate emergency and not to delay time,” said Kanfen, whose committee will be responsible for passing the European Parliament to guide many laws.
CanfinA French centrist member of the European Parliament said that if the center-right legislators of the European People’s Party try to “dilute the plan, then we are likely to choose what we call a progressive majority”—referring to liberals, social democrats, leftists and Green and some rebel EPP members of the European Parliament.
Martha Myers, an energy poverty activist at Friends of the Earth Europe, said that these proposals are “not suitable for the just energy transition that people and the planet desperately need”. She added: “The Commission’s move to extend emissions trading to buildings shows a lack of solidarity. It throws low-income people into waters where energy prices are high, while providing only a small amount of support to alleviate energy poverty.”
