Massive effort on negative emissions and stronger global orientation of European climate policy /Aim is climate-neutral industrial region as a model for other parts of the world / Negotiate hard on implementation of border adjustment mechanism CBAM

Next Monday, the highly anticipated latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will be published. The scientists are expected to warn in particular about the danger of extreme weather events. “The individual reports on which the so-called synthesis report of the IPCC is based on describe quite clearly that extreme weather events, such as the floods in Germany in July 2021 and extreme drought in many regions of the world are linked to climate change, and that these events will become much more frequent if we do not counteract them vigorously. I expect this to be clearly underlined again on Monday," said the environmental spokesperson of the largest group in the European Parliament (EPP, Christian Democrats) Dr Peter Liese.


Liese also assumes that the importance of negative emissions will be emphasised more strongly than before: "The IPCC has already made it clear in the individual reports that the Paris climate target can only be achieved if we not only reduce emissions as quickly as possible, but also promote technologies that manage to remove CO2 from the atmosphere. We need to support natural sinks, for example through afforestation and the rewetting of peatlands, but also through technical solutions such as "direct air capture", meaning the extraction of CO2 from the air in order to manufacture products with it. These techniques are still very expensive at the moment, but if we don't develop them now, they will never be used on an industrial scale and a cost degression must be achieved as quickly as possible. Twenty-five years ago, photovoltaics was also exorbitantly expensive and today it is an important part of our energy supply," said Liese.

Furthermore, the MEP stressed the importance of international climate policy. "If Europe achieves the targets it has set for itself, we will be an absolute pioneer on the international stage. For example, achieving Europe's 55% net climate target and at the same time the USA reaching its 50% target would mean that in 2030 US-Americans will still produce 2.5 times more emissions per capita than Europeans. And we will even overachieve our target, as we passed the relevant legislation last week (EU’s land use and forestry regulation LULUCF brings the climate target to 57%). That is why we must finally stop focusing the debate on a few percentage points in Europe and do everything we can to be more successful internationally in climate protection. This means:

This means:

  1. We must manage to decarbonise our industry and thus be a global role model. A deindustrialised continent does not help to convince China and others.
  2. We must defend the agreement on the border adjustment mechanism CBAM with strength and commitment. Concerns from third countries must not lead to the EU not implementing the border adjustment mechanism. I am very pleased to see that some third countries are already thinking about increasing their ambition in order to not be disadvantaged by CBAM. For others, a lot of commitment is still needed.
  3. The European Commission must increase its dedication to climate diplomacy. Our group believes that we need a European John Kerry, a prominent chief climate negotiator, who will work powerfully all year to ensure that others embark on a similar path as the European Union",

said environmental politician Peter Liese.