European Union Ends Biofuel Battle to Get Green Energy Deal
The European Union agreed on Thursday a series of ways to promote green energy after resolving a long-running battle over biofuels. But Italy would not drop its demand to review the legislation in 2014, preventing the European Union from signing off on a deal to get 20 percent of the bloc’s energy from renewable sources by 2020.
“We have agreement on everything except the deletion of the review clause,” the European Parliament’s lead negotiator Claude Turmes told Reuters after closed-door talks that went on until the early hours.
The green energy laws are a major part of an EU package to fight climate change, which it hopes will help spur a global deal with other big emitters like China and the United States.
“Europe faces a moment of truth over the next week on the issue of climate change as to whether this package goes through and goes through with environmental integrity,” British climate minister Ed Miliband told reporters.
Until Thursday, debate over biofuels had been deadlocked, holding back other measures to promote wind farms, solar power and energy from tides.
The European Commission proposed in January that 10 percent of road transport fuel should come from renewable sources by 2020. Much of that would come from biofuels, creating a large market that is coveted by exporters such as Brazil and Indonesia, as well as EU farming nations.
But environmentalists said biofuels made from grains and oilseeds were pushing up food prices and forcing subsistence farmers to expand agricultural land by hacking into rainforests and draining wetlands — known as “indirect land-use change.”
The stand-off over biofuels ended with an agreement that up to almost a third of the EU’s 10 percent goal would be met not through biofuels but through electric cars and trains.
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“The 10 percent agri-fuels target has been seriously undermined,” said Turmes. “The future cars will be electric … and there will be a strong push to get all trains in Europe to run on green electricity.”
The European Commission will also come forward with proposals in 2010 to limit indirect land-use change, and biofuels from non-food sources will be promoted.
Turmes said Italy’s demand for a review would undermine investment security and put at risk thousands of new jobs. Environmental groups also criticized the proposal, which diplomats said was supported by Austria, Cyprus and Malta.
“The negotiations were not concluded today because of one country, Italy, trying to destabilize the renewables directive in the interest of its large energy companies and against the interest of European citizens, the economy and the climate,” said Greenpeace campaigner Frauke Thies.
The EU’s overall target of getting 20 percent of energy from renewable sources by 2020 was firmed up and member states will now have to roll out detailed road maps on how to reach their national targets for green energy.
And mechanisms were agreed to improve the access of renewable energy to electricity grids.
Countries will also be able to join forces on renewables, after pressure from Britain, Poland and Germany, which want to team up on EU projects, as well as Italy, which wants to tap into north Africa’s large potential for solar power.
Separately in Brussels, new fuel quality laws were agreed that would curb the flaring of gases from refineries and make some sources of oil like Canadian tar sands less viable.
The provisional deal will need approval by the European Parliament and all 27 European Union nations before becoming law, but is not expected to change much.
S: Reuters
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Tags: Biofuel, EU, Green Energy
