Until the end, the question of whether gas and nuclear should be considered “sustainable” poisoned the life of the European Commission. After several postponements, the Community executive ended up publishing, on Wednesday February 2, its delegated act – the European equivalent of a decree – on the taxonomy, which recognizes their contribution, under certain conditions, to the fight against global warming. .
In the midst of the boom in green finance, the text, which proposes a classification of activities likely to support the ecological transition, should help mobilize private funds for activities that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while Europeans have pledged to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. If they want to keep their promise, they will indeed have to invest 350 billion euros per year and, as the Commission points out, “there is not a lot of public money for that”.
Even the college of the Commission, which brings together its president, Ursula von der Leyen, and the twenty-six other commissioners, is largely divided on the subject. Where this body usually takes decisions by consensus, they were three to vote, Wednesday, against the delegated act: the Austrian Johannes Hahn, in charge of the budget, the Spaniard Josep Borrell, High Representative for Foreign Affairs and security policy, and the Portuguese Elisa Ferreira, responsible for cohesion and reforms.
Reducing the carbon footprint of the Twenty-Seven
The Luxembourger Nicolas Schmit (employment) and the Lithuanian Virginijus Sinkevicius (environment) were absent. But on Monday, their chiefs of staff, during a meeting devoted to taxonomy with their counterparts, had expressed their reluctance. Just like the collaborators of the two vice-presidents of the Commission, the Dane Margrethe Vestager and the Dutchman Frans Timmermans. The chief of staff of the Italian Paolo Gentiloni (economy) also expressed, on this occasion, the doubts of his superior.
“We are less than thirty years old” for implement the Paris agreement and gas such as nuclear “Help with transition”argues the Commissioner for Financial Services, Mairead McGuinness, to defend the choice of the Community executive to integrate these two energies into the taxonomy.
Admittedly, neither nuclear energy, the operation of which generates highly radioactive waste, nor gas, which emits CO2, “are not green or sustainable”, admits the Commission. But, in a Europe where 15% of electricity production still comes from coal-fired power stations and where renewable energies do not guarantee a stable supply, they make it possible to reduce the carbon footprint of the Twenty-Seven. “It’s probably not perfect, but it’s a solution”launches Mairead McGuinness, who recalls the conditions which accompany the granting of the “green” label to these two energies.
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