Meeting in the plenary session of the European Parliament, on Tuesday 5 October MEPs rejected by a large majority two proposed objections to the delegated act aimed at completing the EU taxonomy by establishing technical criteria for defining which activities contribute substantially to climate change adaptation or mitigation while doing no significant harm to any of the other six environmental objectives of the Taxonomy Regulation (2020/852).
Initiating one of the two objection requests, ECR group MEPs Alexandr Vondra (Czech Republic) and Bogdan Rzońca (Poland) regretted that the delegated act proposed by the European Commission does not cover fossil gas and nuclear power (see EUROPE 12703/2). In their view, both energy sources are necessary for the energy transition and for maintaining an affordable energy supply.
“We believe that the Commission has not adequately considered the long-term effects and broader implications of the so-called taxonomy, including the risk of energy poverty among EU citizens”, said Mr Vondra.
The other request for objection, made by Joëlle Mélin (Identity and Democracy, France), also aimed to ask the Commission to present “a new delegated act which includes nuclear and gas activities” and to include nuclear energy among the energies compatible with the objectives of the taxonomy regulation.
The Parliament had until 7 October to oppose the delegated act. (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)