In the coming days, the European Parliament will vote on the new climate targets. If the European Union wants to achieve neutrality, greater ambition is needed.
If the European Union's long-term objective remains to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, in the short term it is necessary to review and update the current legislation on climate, energy and transport in order to reduce emissions and become independent from fossil fuels imported from Russia well before 2030.
This was recently discussed in the European Parliament, where a group of MEPs, ahead of the June and July plenary sessions at which the European Parliament is due to vote on the largest climate package ever, and given the changed energy situation brought about by the war in Ukraine, presented proposals on how to make the Fit for 55 targets more ambitious.
The Fit for 55 climate package — that is, the measures forming part of the Green Deal aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55 per cent by 2030 compared to 1990 levels — was approved by the European Commission on 14 July last year. The initiatives included in the Fit for 55 package can be summarised in 5 points:
As regards the Emissions Trading System (ETS), this has been in force since 2005 and currently covers approximately 41 per cent of the European Union's greenhouse gas emissions. It obliges more than 11,000 power plants and industrial facilities to hold a permit for every tonne of CO2 emitted. This is intended to serve as an incentive: the less you pollute, the less you pay. Companies must purchase permits through auctions, and the price is influenced by supply and demand.
The progressive and environmentalist forces that make up the majority of the European Parliamentary Committee on the Environment are calling for the extension of the current ETS to maritime transport and the creation of a new one (ETS II), distinct and covering buildings and road transport. On the other side, however, the conservatives — who take the side of companies and their interests — are applying the brakes and seeking a compromise, so much so that the liberal chair of the environment committee, Pascal Canfin, admits that on environmental issues there is "a tsunami of lobbying activity".
Despite the resistance of the more conservative wing, the environment committee also proposes to phase out the free allocation of emissions allowances both in the aviation sector and in all those sectors that will in future be covered by the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM).
The aim of the CBAM (under discussion since 2020) is to introduce a system capable of affecting the prices of imported products, ensuring that they "incorporate" the cost of greenhouse gas emissions linked to manufacturing, thereby avoiding unfair competition from countries that are not making sufficient efforts on climate and to which Western companies have relocated part of their operations, precisely to take advantage of more permissive environmental legislation.
The CBAM would apply from 1 January 2023, with a transitional period until the end of 2024, and MEPs state that it must be fully implemented for all sectors of the emissions trading system (ETS) by 2030, 5 years earlier than proposed by the Commission.
In addition to the proposals to update the ETS and the CBAM, the package to be voted on by the European Parliament between 6 and 9 June includes new CO2 reduction targets. One of these is to reduce the emissions of new cars and vans by 55 and 50 per cent respectively by 2030. Furthermore, by 2035 all new passenger cars and vans placed on the market will have to produce zero emissions.
A further objective of the Fit for 55 package under discussion is to increase energy efficiency, through the revision of the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) and the Renewable Energy Directive (RED). With regard to the former, the Parliament's proposal is to raise the energy efficiency target to 36 per cent for final energy consumption and 39 per cent for primary energy consumption, that is, directly from the source.
With regard to the RED, member states are required to double the share of renewable energy to a minimum of 40 per cent by 2030. The proposal is to oblige all sectors of the economy, with particular attention to transport, construction and industry, where progress on the energy transition is slower. The package also includes proposals to increase the use of alternative fuels in aviation and maritime transport.
And then there is the Social Climate Fund, introduced to address the social and economic impact arising from the new ETS and the CBAM. The European Commission had proposed allocating 72 billion euros over the 2025–32 period to help member states provide support measures and investments in energy efficiency measures.
According to the parliamentary environment committee, however, fewer resources could be allocated to the fund (figures of just under 45 billion have been mentioned): the risk is that of underfunding a strategic fund for achieving European climate targets, thereby reducing the impact on citizens.
Ultimately, Democrats and Greens in Parliament are pushing for ambitious new plans, while the conservatives are concerned about not placing further "burdens" on companies' shoulders. For this reason, the progressive and environmentalist forces are preparing a united front to get the new proposals passed at the forthcoming votes. A decision will also soon be made on the inclusion of gas and nuclear energy in the green taxonomy: Bas Eickhout of the Greens–European Free Alliance is optimistic about their possible and definitive exclusion: "The alliance between political forces can work." Indeed, this is politics. And in the coming weeks we will see just how serious the European Union is about its climate targets.
