May 3, 2007
People in green houses…
How green is the European Commission? It claimed on Thursday it was very green indeed. A leader in fighting climate change and cutting car pollution, it would now seek to become a green imperium, pushing others around the world to adopt its ways.
The European Union’s global environmental policies should become “one of the core objectives of EU external relations policy”, a mid-term review said. There should be EU-wide taxes to encourage good environmental behaviour.
After all, commissioner Stavros Dimas pointed out, much remained to be done. "Global emissions of greenhouse gases are rising, the loss of biodiversity is not yet under control, pollution is still harming public health and volumes of waste are increasing in Europe,” he said.
What was needed was more money and ensuring a green tinge to everything from energy to agriculture policy. It was a breathtaking power grab and a huge contrast to when Jose Manuel Barroso’s Commission took office.
Then, in its attempts to be business-friendly, it promised to cut red – and green – tape, and free enterprise to make money and create jobs.
Al Gore and Sir Nicholas Stern changed all that, and the EU embraced the environmental agenda as something around which most countries could rally.
At a summit in March, EU leaders set targets for 20 per cent of energy to come from renewable sources and for biofuel to make up 10 per cent of vehicle fuels by 2020. The EU’s emissions trading scheme, which debuted in 2005, would lead a 20 per cent reduction in greenhouse gases between 1990 and 2020.
The change is still not happening fast enough for the green lobby. The so-called green 10 of leading environmental groups last week brought out their own report on the Barroso Commission. It gave it a 43 per cent fail grade, below that of the previous one, run by Romano Prodi from 1999-2004.
While performing well on climate change, it had ignored biodiversity, illegal logging and a whole host of issues, they said.
Matthias Duwe, of the Climate Action Network, said that the fixation on carbon reduction could prevent action in other areas.
Meanwhile, Barroso clung to the "dated notion that what’s good for the environment cannot be good for the economy”, said Jorgo Riss, of Greenpeace.
Mr Dimas’ spokeswoman disputed that. “We have seen a whole new approach to environmental issues. We have demonstrated that the environment and the economy are not two different issues. The environment can stimulate innovation.”
Yup, it’s all about the money. How much does the global warming cost? What to ask tax-money for? I am sure that they think money solve everything. It’s like if you pay a tax, the problem dissapears. But, in reality, things are not like that. And this is because global warming does not happend as much because of the pollution in the athmosphere or because energy consumption, as much as it happens because of the oceans(as shown at www.1ocean-1climate.com) and their dynamic.
Posted by: Adrianne | May 3rd, 2007 at 5:00 pm | Report this commentThis issue was touched on in a previous blog entry here on the FT site (I think it was George Parker’s).
I think there is some truth to the allegation that many on the economic right are mistaken in seeing a conflict between what is good for the economy and what is good for the environment. GDP is not a satisfactory measure of anything much - it should be regarded as one of a series of indicators that can be used to measure economic or environmental or human well-being, but it is given a uniquely privileged place - all news media (including the FT) report on GDP as if it were THE most critical piece of economic news.
But more specifically as regards the Commission, I think that whatever Barroso’s green rating, his Commission is doing something that no other Commission has ever done. It is putting environmental issues, and particularly climate change, at the very heart of its policy agenda, and is seeking to integrate environmental objectives into policy development in an entirely new way. This will inevitably take time.
The CAP and CFP will have to be “greened”. Regional policy, with structural funds and other EU funds, will have to begin to integrate environmental objectives where until now they have been aiming solely at GDP and “cohesion”. Internal Market rules are increasingly being subjected to impact assessments; these will doubtless become ever more sensitive to environmental objectives too. Foreign and development policy will have to see a shift in focus to include environmental objectives. Transport policy will continue to go greener. And then of course there is environmental policy per se, which will become increasingly high profile.
I am a little disappointed with the green lobby for attacking the Commission’s greenness however, especially in light of REACH, which is perhaps the most un-neo-liberal piece of legislation ever to come out of the Commission - an absolutely gargantuan piece of environmental regulation that has paid scant regard to economic growth in the opinion of industry. Surely that is worth a few green points?
Posted by: Chris Sherwood | May 4th, 2007 at 8:48 am | Report this comment