Not knowing who the Commissioners responsible for Energy and Climate in the future European Commission will be, Mauro Petriccione, Director General (DG Climate Action), told MEPs on 5 September of the projects that are mobilising the services of the Parliament Commission “by extrapolating the political guidelines of Ms Ursula von der Leyen”, the institution's President-elect.
And there is no shortage of them, whether it is the EU's decarbonisation policy or its policy of climate change adaptation, while the implementation of all the Energy/Climate legislation adopted over the past 5 years will continue.
Accelerate decarbonisation. The Commission will work on two main areas: – it will build on the achievements: “We will have to accelerate our work and our ambitions. Move faster than originally planned," indicated Mr Petriccione; – it will also have to take into account the radical change in the EU's political and economic climate situation since 2014 (when the outgoing Commission began its work) in order to move towards climate neutrality. This ambition has been analysed to lay the foundations for a European vision. It is expected that the four Member States, concerned about the means to finance their restructuring, will join the objective, supported by the other 24, of decarbonising the European economy by 2050, while respecting European competitiveness and socially just transition.
Ambition for 2030. “Mrs Ursula von der Leyen's guidelines ask a very clear question: when are we going to make our next economic analysis as quickly, fully and transparently as possible so that, from 2019, the EU knows what realistic ambitions it can have for 2030 and not just in the long term?” said Mr Petriccione.
Mrs von der Leyen proposes raising the EU's greenhouse gas emission reduction target to 55% by 2030 compared to 1990. If all legislation is properly implemented, the EU can reach 45% (instead of at least 40% by 2030).
An action plan for sustainable financing. The Commission has stated that it wants to launch a long-term sustainable investment plan. Recalling that the challenge for a successful clean transition is to have a massive investment effort in the EU within 10 years, Mr Petriccione stressed that the Commission has also proposed new, better quality instruments and to further integrate climate in an EU budget in line with the Paris Agreement.
On 5 September, the parliamentary committee voted to ensure that 40% of the budget is climate-related (compared to 20% at present), which was welcomed by its chairman, Pascal Canfin. “Things are moving”, he said on Twitter.
The Commission has also done a lot of work on sustainable financing by creating the framework conditions for investors to know whether what they are investing in is sustainable.
“The time has come to take all this on board in an action plan that can evolve over time. We don't want perfection right away”, Mr Petriccione said.
A new adaptation strategy. Now that 25 Member States have an adaptation plan and the others are working on it, since the adoption of the 2013 adaptation strategy, which was maintained as it stands in 2018, the time has come to have a new EU adaptation strategy. “We don't want to over-regulate, but we can act”, he said.
For example, the Commission is already working on the review of the European Investment Fund in the light of climate action. “We will submit guidelines to see which investments are compatible with the climate”. They will be made available to Member States, local authorities and insurance companies to develop provisions for verifying the compatibility of investment projects. Knowledge will be gathered on what types of building standards would improve climate resilience. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)