MEPs back away from 30% emissions target

Centre-right MEPs block move to push for increase in emissions reduction target.

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The push for the EU to increase its emissions reduction target for 2020 from 20% to 30% was dealt another blow today (31 January). Centre-right members of the European Parliament’s environment committee blocked a move to include a call for the increase in a report on the European Commission’s low-carbon roadmap to 2050.

The rejection follows a similar defeat for the 30% cause in a full vote by the Parliament last July. Centre-right MEPs have said the EU should not move to a 30% target without equivalent action from global competitors. The Socialists, Liberals and Greens want a unilateral move.

Following the vote, Bas Eickhout, a Dutch Green MEP, blasted the opposition from the centre-right European People’s Party and European Conservative and Reformist groups, pointing to a study published yesterday by the Commission that says there would be long-term economic benefits to moving to a 30% target.

“It is frustrating that conservative and centre-right MEPs continue to keep their heads in the sand with regard to climate policy,” he said. “It’s clear that the EU’s current 20% emissions target for 2020 is completely obsolete.”

The environment committee broadly welcomed the Commission’s roadmap, which calls for the EU to reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions by 40% by 2030, by 60% by 2040, and by 80% by 2050.

MEPs used the opportunity to again call for the EU to set-aside excess allowances in the EU’s emissions trading scheme (ETS) in 2013 in order to raise the carbon price. They made the same call in a vote on the energy efficiency directive in December.