(Reuters) – European Union lawmakers are considering toughening the bloc’s planned climate law, with stricter near-term emission goals and a binding commitment for every member state to decarbonize by 2050, according to a draft document seen by Reuters. FILE PHOTO: European Union flags fly outside the European Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, February 19, 2020 REUTERS/Yves Herman/File Photo
Such goals are required if the world is to stick within limits scientists say are needed to avoid devastating fallout from global warming, the lead author of the document, Swedish lawmaker Jytte Guteland, said.
The European Commission, the EU’s executive, proposed the law in March – weeks before the coronavirus pandemic prompted an economic crisis that the bloc has pledged to tackle with “green” investment.
Centred around a legally binding goal to cut EU net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050, the law must be agreed with lawmakers and member states to take effect.
Under a draft proposal for the parliament’s position on the law, each individual EU country would need to reduce its national emissions to net zero by 2050 and achieve net “removals” of greenhouse gases after that date.
This is tougher than the Commission’s bloc-wide 2050 target, which had raised the possibility that some of its 27 members could decarbonise later, if others did so early.
The draft also calls for the EU’s 2030 climate target to be tightened to a 65% cut in emissions from 1990 levels, rather than the 50% or 55% cut being considered by the Commission.
Guteland, who guides the parliament’s talks on the climate law, said the proposal fits the emissions pathway scientists say would avoid catastrophic climate change.
“Scientists are talking about planetary limits. If we do not limit our emissions faster during the first 10 years, then we might actually go over the planetary limits,” she told Reuters of the risk of breaching the crucial 1.5 degrees boundary.
“It is political choice whether we do it or not.”
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I love this part: “Countries not on track would receive recommendations from the Commission, and could face fines if they flout the advice.”
If you’re fined for not following advice, then it isn’t advice.
This EU law maker doesn’t come from Sweden, by any chance?
Whilst everyone on here is looking with a mixture of horror and schadenfreude at the EU’s suicide note, there is another thread to the Commissariat”s cunning plan.
Due to basic demographics, it is now projected that Austria will have a “Religion of Peace” majority by 2045.
Other countries and especially major cities (London, Paris, Malmo, Brussels) are already leading the way.
Will this cultural change help meet the EU’s “Climate” aspirations?
I wonder…
good luck with that, EU. setting aside COP26 being postponed –
7 Feb: Climate Home: World misses symbolic February deadline to ratchet up climate action before Cop26
The 2015 Paris Agreement seeks to raise global ambition every five years. But only three nations have issued upgraded climate plans nine months before Cop26 in Glasgow
PIC: GRETA: Countries are under pressure to submit tougher climate plan this year but only two have met a symbolic February deadline.
by Alister Doyle
Only three nations have submitted upgraded climate plans nine months before the start of November’s summit in Glasgow, adding to uncertainties after UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson last week sacked Claire O’Neill, who was due to preside at the talks…
A little-noticed paragraph 25 in the 2015 UN decision implementing the Paris Agreement says that such climate action plans, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), are meant to be submitted to the UN “at least 9 to 12 months in advance of the relevant session” of the Cop.
Sunday 9 February marks nine months before the start of Cop26, from 9-19 November. NDCs are crucial in defining national policies for the next 5-10 years…
Originally, the Paris Agreement had been expected to start in 2020 and several legal scholars said the nine-month deadline in the Paris text strictly applies only to future five-year milestones starting with 2025, 2030, 2035 and 2040.
But the Paris Agreement entered into force far earlier than expected in 2016 after many governments ratified, adding pressure for the spirit of paragraph 25 to apply in 2020 amid pressure from voters, companies, cities, NGOs and youth activists led by Greta Thunberg…
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/02/07/world-misses-symbolic-february-deadline-ratchet-climate-action-cop26/
10 Feb: Climate Home: Marshall Islands, Suriname, Norway upgrade climate plans before Cop26
The three nations account for 0.1% of global emissions. Norway says 9 February was the deadline for new plans before climate talks in November
By Alister Doyle
The Marshall Islands, Suriname and Norway have submitted plans for tougher action to tackle climate change before a five-year milestone of the Paris Agreement in 2020, with almost 200 others ignoring an informal 9 February deadline…
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/02/10/which-countries-updated-ndc-2020-marshall-islands-suriname-norway-cop26/
3 Apr: Climate Home: Japan’s woeful climate plan amounts to science denial
Japan reiterates past pledges for 2030 rather than mapping out a radical overhaul needed by the world’s fifth largest greenhouse gas emitter
By Shekhar Deepak Singh
(Dr Shekhar Deepak Singh is a post-doctoral researcher at the Chinese University of Hong Kong specialising on issues of Energy Policy, Environment and Sustainable Development)
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/04/03/japans-woeful-climate-plan-amounts-science-denial/
9 Apr: Climate Home: The US election is even more crucial with UN climate talks delayed to 2021
A Democratic president could be a game changer for the international fight against climate change, beyond rejoining the Paris Agreement
By Thom Woodroofe and Brendan Guy
(Thom Woodroofe is the Senior Advisor on Multilateral Affairs to the President of the Asia Society Policy Institute and is a former climate diplomat.
Brendan Guy is the Manager of International Policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council)
And while President Trump has expanded offshore drilling and overseas financing of fossil fuel projects in recent years, Biden has outlined an ambitious and far reaching international climate agenda that goes beyond simply returning the US to the Paris Agreement.
For example, Biden has said he would also put the economy on track to reach net zero emissions no later than 2050, implement carbon border fees or quotas on carbon-intensive goods, recommit investments through the Green Climate Fund, phase out fossil fuel subsidies globally, accelerate emissions reductions in key sectors such as aviation and shipping, and also make climate change a core national security priority…
But a potential Biden administration – with its inevitable commitment to bring a more ambitious 2030 national target on behalf of the United States – has the potential to unlock similar efforts by other major emitters, including China, India, Japan, and Australia.
This is partly why it is also important a potential Biden administration does not rush to table a new 2030 national target at the same time they rejoin the Paris Agreement, but instead seeks to leverage it for maximum impact diplomatically.
One important opportunity to do this would be through Biden’s idea to convene a world leaders’ summit on climate change early in his administration…
https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/04/09/us-election-even-crucial-un-climate-talks-delayed-2021/
These insane Leftist CAGW targets will completely destroy what’s left of the global economy following the equally insane consequences from the Wuhan-flu global economic shutdown…
What’s truly ironic is that the AMO and PDO seem to be entering their respective 30-year ocean cool cycles, a strong La Niña cycle (1st in 10 years) seems to be developing, and a 50-year Grand Solar Minimum event just started, so by 2050, global temps will likely be substantially falling due to natural climatic events, despite record global CO2 emissions…
We’ll see how long this silly CAGW charade can continue..
Dear Samurai,
You are very optimistic:
“Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.”
Albert Einstein
(https://www.azquotes.com/author/4399-Albert_Einstein?p=2 )
I can’t take seriously the intellect of these people who think thats solar/wind is going to play any significant part in lowering emissions. If they can’t see that the obvious future no carbon energy generators will be small modular molten salt reactors, fueled either by uranium or Thorium, then
they don’t deserve attention for anything they say. These reactors have the ability to produce power as cheaply as any fossil uel (except the lowest priced natural gas) – around 4 cents per kWhr, levelized, and have the additional ability to act as peak and baseload generators, to be locatable just about anywhere (no need for space or cooling bodies of water) and buildable in plants at a rapid pace and installable upon minimally prepared sites. To ignore this imminent, vastly superior technology (within 7 years) indicates a view that deserves to be characterized as unqulaified to deal with the subject altogether. These people are just plain energy-stupid.
Looking for another wave of immigration to America. With Harry and Meghan it may already have started.
But the reality is that there is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on climate. There is plenty of scientific rationale to support the conclusion that the climate sensitivity of CO2 is zero. There are many good reasons to be conserving on the use of fossil fuels but climate change is not one of them. The best way to reduce the use of fossil fuels is to replace ageing fossil fuel power plants with nuclear power plants.
The UK is already out of the EU.
What is happening now is a voluntary transition period, to try to make the split easier for both.
The UK has agreed to continue to behave as if it were a member, still following EU regulations and treating EU residents as they did before.
By the end of the year, there are supposed to be agreements on how EU residents will be treated in the UK, and how UK residents will be treated in the EU. How the Irish border will be handled, and various other things like fishing limits in UK territorial waters and trading agreements.
Some of that is relatively easy. Or should be. But the EU is trying to play hardball with fishing limits, basically wanting none. What they don’t seem to understand is that there are two answers: whatever the UK agrees to hand out, revised on an annual basis, or nothing at all. They may have to learn the hard way. Same with the Irish border. Either leave it open, which the UK is ok with, or if the EU doesn’t want the Irish to be able to hop over the border and buy a vacuum cleaner that actually sucks, for example, then they are going to have to create and man the border so that it becomes clear to the Irish just who is restricting who.
COVID shows us where the limits of European liberty are. All borders are closed. So much for liberty of movement. This thing will further unravel the EU as some member states will decide that they cannot take the burden anymore and will snipe at those rules from inside. Some will just balk as politicians will recognize that its easier to blame it on the EU rather than face public unrest. The EU is in for hard times.
Knock yourself out, EU. Don’t count on the USA supporting your socialist agenda. We have problems ourselves with our virus cost and the socialist demowits from within our own 240 year old Republic Democracy founded back then. The Nazis and commies have been trying to take over the most successful Nation on the face of the Earth ever since Karl Marx penned his Communist Manifesto (~1840s) and his Marxist armies took over our Ivy League schools (1880s). Too bad General Patton didn’t live to take on the USSR after WWII. Mao Zedong was stopped short of taking over S Korea and we were winning the battles and war in ‘Nam until LBJ decided to go to the peace table.
The truly insane thing is that the IPCC SR15 report that everyone refers to says that the difference between 1.5 degrees of warming and 2.0 are small. Nor is exceeding 2.0 all that bad. Yet somehow 1.5 has morphed into the threshold to catastrophe. No science, not even IPCC science, supports this nonsense.