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Wednesday, April 21, 2021

EU Emissions Target

 As we have seen so many times climate proposals agreed with by governments are often playing with figures on paper.

After 14 hours of intensive negotiations, representatives of the EU’s member states and parliament  a new EU target of a 55% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 has been agreed and immediately described as a “farce” by environmental groups.

Wendel Trio, the director of Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe, an alliance of environmental NGOs, said: “The ‘at least 55% emission reduction target for 2030’ is not in line with the Paris agreement’s ambition to limit temperature rise to 1.5C by the end of the century.” Trio said the target had been “rushed by EU lawmakers to bring something to the leaders’ summit organised by the US”. “This is definitely not the kind of climate law that will help the EU to lead the global efforts to tackle climate change,” he said.

Barbara Mariani, senior policy officer for climate and energy with the European Environmental Bureau (EEB), said the target translated to only a 52.8% cut in actual emissions from polluting sectors as the larger figure took into account emissions that could potentially be absorbed. Under current measures the EU already expects to reduce emissions by 46% of 2030.

“Today’s agreement is not a victory for climate action, it’s a farce,” Mariani said. “We are also baffled to see that the council [of member states] rejected a proposal to extend the EU’s climate neutrality target to all member states, which risks triggering lack of accountability at national level and creating a two-speed Europe in which some countries will inevitably lag behind.”

New EU target to cut carbon emissions by at least 55% disappoints experts | Greenhouse gas emissions | The Guardian

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