MEPs support reducing CO ₂ emissions to 60% by 2030

The European Parliament’s (EP) Environment Committee today called for a 60% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 1990 levels, a considerable increase from the European Commission’s initial proposal, which called for 40%.

This vote is the first step to set the position of the European Parliament in future negotiations with the Council, which represents the countries, of the so-called European Climate Law, which wants to set 2050 as the deadline to decarbonize the EU economy.

This declared objective is still pending the full approval of Poland, which at the European Council was detached from the rest of the Member States in a decision that requires unanimity.

The president of the Environment Committee of the European Parliament, the Frenchman Pascal Canfin, stressed that this is the most ambitious objective they have supported so far and pointed out that the proposal includes “measures to impose financial sanctions on countries that do not comply with their climate commitments”, an extreme that still has to be negotiated with the Council.

The rapporteur of the text, the Swedish Jytte Guteland, had initially opted for a reduction of 65%, which was supported by groups such as the Social Democrats, Greens and the Left, but it generated doubts in the liberals and did not like the popular.

“We have fought hard for a powerful target for 2030, and we are pleased to have 60%, even though we were fighting for 65%. It is a significant improvement over the Commission’s proposal and makes the European Climate Law fit for purpose,” Guteland said.

The popular spokesman in this parliamentary committee, the German Peter Liese, considered the result “a Pyrrhic victory for the left” and was convinced that the plenary of Parliament as a whole will support a more limited reduction in the final vote.

“Declaring goals without having a plan on how to achieve them doesn’t help the climate,” Liese said.

In the absence of the plenary of the European Parliament confirming or modifying this proposal to increase eu climate ambitions in the medium term, predictably in October, environmental organizations such as Greenpeace considered the goal of 60% “one more step” towards what is necessary to limit the growth of the global average temperature below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

“This new stance represents great progress against the current painfully low reduction target of at least 40%, and against the range between 50% and 55% that the Commission is evaluating,” said the NGO Climate Action Network.

However, only a dozen European states, including Spain, support a priori a 55% reduction target.

Source: The Vanguard