BRUSSELS — The European Union’s national leaders spent a summit venting their frustration about the bloc’s green transition — and ultimately agreed on language that didn’t demand specific changes to climate legislation.
Thursday’s debate centered on how to align the EU’s climate goals with economic priorities, and was meant to resolve a deadlock over the bloc’s new emissions-cutting target for 2040.
Many leaders raised national pet issues during the discussion, seven diplomats briefed on the talks said. But they refrained from insisting their specific concerns be addressed in the final summit text — which would have made it impossible to reach a consensus agreement.
The eventual conclusions were agreed unchanged from the draft text prepared by diplomats this week — though few countries were entirely satisfied with the outcome. “Classic balance, everyone equally unhappy,” one diplomat said.
Members of several governments were left wondering what difference the agreement would make for the 2040 climate target. Ministers had postponed their vote on the new goal in September, after some of the EU’s largest countries refused to approve the law without their leaders having a say.
But the text agreed Thursday is deliberately vague, and stops short of endorsing the 2040 goal. That target, as proposed by the European Commission, would reduce the EU’s planet-warming emissions by up to 90 percent below 1990 levels. Ministers are due to reconvene and cast a vote on Nov. 4 — “groundhog day,” a second diplomat said.
A third EU diplomat said they did “not see how the cards are any different” than in September, when ministers first tried to vote on the target. Leaders may just have “delayed the crisis” to Nov. 4, the diplomat added.
Yet a fourth and fifth diplomat said they felt the discussion had sufficiently reassured key countries, particularly France and Germany, to enable them to support the target in the upcoming vote.
The leaders’ agreement sets out “the enabling conditions” to achieve the climate target, the fourth diplomat said, with details to be worked out ahead of the Nov. 4 meeting.
But the devil may be in those very details. After leaders approved the text, some diplomats interpreted a passage on the bloc’s new carbon tax on transport and heating fuels as opening the door to delaying its implementation. Other diplomats said that was not how they read the text.
Still, many diplomats expressed relief that the debate had gone smoothly amid concerns that some leaders wanted to use the discussion to demand the EU weaken certain climate laws.
Earlier in the week, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen had issued a letter offering concessions to leaders, including revisions of some green laws and measures to limit the new carbon price.
This letter, a seventh diplomat said, “was a game changer” and a decisive factor allowing leaders to reach Thursday’s agreement.
Clea Caulcutt contributed reporting.
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