According to a recent European Parliament’s report represented on 3 June, the EU should go for a 30% CO² reduction target which could be reviewed down to -20% if there is no international agreement. This report, made by the Finnish Green MEP Satu Hassi, responds to the Commission proposal that outlines how EU countries should share the effort of cutting their CO² emissions.
But the Commission warned of strong resistance from Member States. A 30% initial target is in direct contrast to the Commission's plans of reducing the Member States CO² emissions by 20% by 2020. According to the Commission the target could only be upped to 30% over the same period if a CO² reduction deal is agreed under the UN.
Another contentious issue is related to the use of the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The report underlined that the CDM system does not contribute significantly to global CO² reductions. Consequently, it proposed to limit Member States’ use of the CDM and change the principle behind the use of CDM credits so that third country projects are used primarily in addition to, rather than as a replacement of, domestic efforts.
However the Commission is not willing to change the existing CDM mechanism because a majority of the projects that would be used towards the 2020 deadline have already been approved for the 2008-2012 trading period of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme.
In addition to the contention between the EP and the Commission, a number of Member States from Central and Eastern Europe complained that the Commission’s effort sharing proposal is biased towards older EU Member States, and called for a revision of the proposal.
The EP’s report will be voted upon by the Parliament's Environment Committee on 7 October 2008, while upcoming negotiations under the French EU Presidency will aim at reaching a deal on the climate and energy package before the end of 2008.
More information on:
http://www.euractiv.com/en/climate-change/parliament-council-set-clash-co2-effort-sharing/article-173019
About the CDM: http://cdm.unfccc.int/index.html
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