On Wednesday 5 February, at the European Parliament, in the presence of MEPs Lena Schilling (Greens/EFA, Austrian) and Lynn Boylan (The Left, Irish), the European Unit of the organisation Greenpeace presented its study showing the feasibility of an act to ban all new fossil fuel projects in the EU.
According to the study, the ban on fossil fuels should take the form of a regulation, directly applicable in all Member States, and would expressly refer to “prohibiting certain activities involving the extraction, production, transportation, distribution and use of fossil fuels in the EU”. In accordance with Article 5 of the Treaty on European Union, it should also respect the principles of conferral, proportionality and subsidiarity, and be adopted on the appropriate legal basis.
According to Luca De Carli, Head of the Strategic Coordination, Legal and Institutional Unit at the European Commission’s DG CLIMA, who attended the debate, this study, co-authored by Dörte Fouquet, is an initiative that effectively sets “the direction of travel” from a legal point of view. Nevertheless, he believes that “in the day-to-day analysis of policies, we would be faced with much more gradual choices”.
In this context, he also called for CO2 capture and storage (CCS) technologies not to be rejected, because “you have to prove that you have alternatives, that you are not significantly limiting the (energy) mix, because there are other ways”.
MPs Schilling and Boylan acknowledged that a proposal to ban new fossil fuel projects would not meet with a majority at present.
“We are faced with different majorities in this Parliament, and this is an issue we need to address, because at the moment we are fighting for every little step, not to move forward, but to avoid going backwards (...)”, said Ms Schilling.
“I’m also a realist: I don’t think it’s going to happen in the next five years (...), but I think things always change, and very quickly, and that’s why we have to be ready (...) (when it changes), because it will change, that’s the nature of politics”, said Ms Boylan, stressing the importance of having a legal feasibility study now.
To see the study: https://aeur.eu/f/fde (Original version in French by Pauline Denys)