According to information gathered by EUROPE, the ambassadors of the Member States to the EU (Coreper) approved on Wednesday 18 November the proposal of the German Presidency of the Council of the European Union to start inter-institutional negotiations (‘trilogues’) on the ‘Climate Law’ on the basis of the partial political agreement (‘general approach’) reached on 23 October.
Nevertheless, the ambassadors demanded that these trilogues should only consist of a general presentation and explanation of the respective positions of the co-legislators. Furthermore, if any negotiations are to take place, they should be limited to the technical points of the ‘Climate Law’.
More political issues such as applying the 2050 climate neutrality target to each Member State (and not just the EU as a whole) will thus be excluded from the discussions, pending a general approach on the entire ‘Climate Law’.
At their last meeting, the Environment Ministers of the Member States were only able to adopt a partial general approach due to the lack of a decision by the 27 Heads of State or Government on raising the EU’s climate target for 2030 (see EUROPE 12588/1).
While the EU27 will try to reach an agreement on this issue at the European Council on 10 and 11 December (see EUROPE 12582/2), a Presidency document seen by EUROPE proposed to the ambassadors to already make progress on the other points of the ‘Climate Law’, in order to”make as much progress as possible” on this issue and thus maximise the chances of completing it before the end of its Presidency (see EUROPE 12572/10).
“The Presidency considers that it would be useful to start informal trilogues with Parliament on the basis of the partial general approach in order to explain the Council’s position to Parliament and to obtain clarifications and further information on Parliament’s position”, explains the document dated 16 November and approved in Coreper on Wednesday.
For their part, the European Parliament and the European Commission have already expressed their wish to start the trilogues as soon as possible.
For the moment, no date has been set.
Parliament adopted its position on 7 October last (see EUROPE 12577/12). (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)