The European Union must have reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 90 to 95 percent by 2040 compared to 1990 levels. Only then can the EU comply with international climate agreements and make its “honest contribution” to the global fight against climate change, says an important adviser to the European Commission.
The official EU climate target for 2030 is an emission reduction of 55 percent and the union must be completely climate neutral by 2050. But there is no interim target for 2040 yet. According to European climate law, the EU leadership must propose such a target early next year.
The same law also created a scientific advisory board to advise the European Commission on climate policy. That council calls on Thursday to set the target at 90 to 95 percent emission reduction in 2040. The scientists describe that as “the upper limit of the achievable”.
According to them, such an ambitious goal is necessary to limit global warming to a maximum of 1.5 degrees. Because there is still a very limited “carbon budget” before that limit is reached, it is important to get emissions down as soon as possible and not wait until 2050.
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The EU must do its fair share
In addition, the EU must reduce its emissions relatively quickly. This is because our continent has emitted a lot in the past and is now prosperous enough to pursue a relatively strict climate policy, say the scientists.
In order to make a truly fair share of global climate policy, the EU should reduce emissions even sharper and faster. “But if you start calculating that, it turns out that we can’t make it,” says Nico Schrijver, emeritus professor of international law and one of the two Dutch members of the advisory council.
That is why the EU should not only take climate measures within its own borders, but also help poor countries to become greener at the same time. “It is not for nothing that it was agreed in Paris that from 2020 the industrialized countries will make at least 100 billion dollars a year available to the non-industrial countries,” says Schrijver. “We haven’t kept that promise yet.”
More than a thousand scenarios
The European Commission is currently holding a public consultation on the climate target for 2040. It describes an emission reduction of 90 percent or more as “very ambitious”, while the Commission sees a target of 65 percent reduction as “little ambitious”.
The EU Climate Council used computer models to study more than a thousand future scenarios to determine how the EU can achieve its ambitious climate targets. Conditions were set with regard to technical feasibility and matters such as environmental protection.
The council describes three “feasible” scenarios that differ in terms of economic developments and energy sources. In one scenario, for example, consumers and companies reduce their energy consumption much further, so that fewer new solar and wind farms need to be built.
In another scenario, much more renewable energy is generated and there is also more focus on techniques to extract CO2 from the air. In yet another scenario, more nuclear power plants will be added.
The Netherlands does not yet have a target for 2040 either
All scenarios have in common that in 2040 virtually no CO2 will be released during the production of electricity. A lot of hydrogen is being produced to replace fossil fuels, and energy consumption in the transport sector is falling rapidly. This has to do with the large-scale switch to electric vehicles.
An ambitious EU target would also mean that emissions must continue to fall rapidly for the Netherlands. This is because our national goals are linked to European ambitions.
It remains to be seen whether such a far-reaching EU climate target is also politically feasible. In recent years, Brussels has passed many ambitious climate laws, but a limit now seems to have been reached for some countries. For example, French President Emmanuel Macron has already called for a “pause” in European environmental policy.
If the European Commission has proposed a climate target for 2040, the member states and the European Parliament still have to approve that proposal.
2023-06-14 22:02:19
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