Europe's green deal faces challenges
In order to achieve the goal of "carbon neutrality" by 2050, the EU launched the European Green Agreement to address climate change at the end of 2019, aiming to accelerate green transformation. However, in the face of obstacles from member states and industries, the green agreement faces challenges.
Since last year, large-scale farmers have broken out in European countries such as Germany, Italy, Belgium, and Poland.protest, calling for the revision of the EU Common Agricultural Policy and the removal of many environmentally-related subsidy application restrictions. Although the Common Agricultural Policy is an integral part of Europe's green deal, the EU has made concessions. For example, restrictions on land use and rotation fallow have been relaxed, and farmers are no longer forced to leave some farmland fallow; farmers can also choose to rotate or increase crop varieties without strictly implementing the EU regulations on rotating planting different crops in order; Environmental protection regulations are further relaxed for farmers under extreme weather conditions such as floods and droughts.
In mid-March this year, the European Commission proposed a proposal to adjust the Common Agricultural Policy, with the goal of unifying agricultural subsidies among EU member states and balancing agricultural competition among countries. The proposal was approved by the European Parliament in late April and approved by EU member states in mid-May. The EU's original intention of issuing agricultural subsidies was to increase production. However, after production increased, the EU turned to emphasis on green transformation and introduced a series of agricultural environmental protection policies, which led to a further increase in agricultural production costs.
Although many pieces of legislation have been enacted for the European Green Agreement, its effective implementation requires practical actions from member states. Due to the slow recovery of Europe's economy, many industries, including the automotive industry, are gradually losing their competitive advantages, forcing the EU and member states to allow climate protection efforts to make more compromises towards economic recovery.
The European Union approved regulations in March 2023 and decided to ban the sale of new fuel-fueled cars and small vans that will cause carbon emissions from 2035 to reduce carbon emissions in the transportation industry. However, at the request of Germany at the time, new fuel vehicles using carbon-neutral fuels may continue to be sold after 2035.
Due to the high prices of electric vehicles in Europe, the exit of subsidy policies, and imperfect charging infrastructure, European auto industry sources revealed that the EU may delay plans to phase out traditional fuel vehicles. In addition, in this year's European Parliament elections, the ban on the sale of fuel vehicles was criticized by centre-right political groups, and industry insiders expect that the ban may be more loosened.
For example, in Lithuania, as of the beginning of 2024, the country's electric vehicles accounted for only 1.2% of the total number of private cars, which reflects that the country's electric vehicle market is still in its early stages of development and faces challenges such as higher costs and insufficient infrastructure compared with traditional vehicles. Although the government has introduced policy incentives, the task of completely phasing out gasoline and diesel vehicles is still very arduous.
It can be seen that the EU has various practical difficulties in promoting the implementation of green agreements and achieving carbon neutrality goals. The German Climate Expert Committee said in June that Germany is unlikely to achieve its goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 65% from 1990 levels by 2030, as industries such as transportation and construction struggle to achieve climate goals.
Research and models by a Norway energy consulting firm show that the EU's energy transformation goals in renewable energy, clean technology production capacity and domestic supply chain investment will lag far behind its competitors.
In stark contrast to the 2019 European Parliament elections, protests against green deals erupted across Europe ahead of this year's elections.boycottActivities. Analysts believe that as the EU's political spectrum "shifts to the right", there will likely be an increase in the number of policymakers who are skeptical about climate goals in the European Parliament, and they may try to weaken laws and regulations related to the green agreement. Therefore, the next five years It is crucial for Europe's green agreement to go.
Philip Jaeger, a researcher on European climate and economic policy at the Jacques Delors Center in Germany, believes that in the medium and long term, the support of the European Parliament and society for a green agreement is crucial. However, if this support disappears or weakens, question marks will be raised whether climate goals can be achieved.
Irina Kusstova, a researcher at the Center for European Policy Studies, believes that the attention to green agreements may decrease in the next few years, but there will be no major fundamental changes. Achieving the goal of "carbon neutrality" by 2050 has become a law. It is unrealistic to abolish these regulations to form a new political balance after the European Parliament election.
(Xinhua Agency, Valletta, August 18, reporter Chen Wenxian)
