EU Reporter

Global leaders fail to set climate goals.

July 10 2009
There was widespread disappointment this week at the failure of world leaders to agree to specific targets for cutting GHG emissions by 2050. Continued scientific uncertainty was cited as the main reason, as is often the case.It may be, however, to early for an agreement, as we prepare for the Copenhagen conference at the end of this year. Any decision now will leave leaders with little to announc... Read more

Countdown to Copenhagen: Russia disappoints environmentalists.

June 25 2009
 Shortly after taking office, at a meeting in the Kremlin in June 2008, Russian  President Medvedev called for higher standards of environmental protection and for the state to finance renewable energy projects. In a rare comment on ecological concerns in Russia’s rapid-growth economy, he was quoted by news agency Interfax as saying “If we think only of the energy wasted in o... Read more

Climate change and the Swedish Presidency

June 18 2009
Today in Brussels, the Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen outlined his hopes for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, to be held in Copenhagen in December. He spoke of the need for the international community to "develop targets, and to show real commitment"  to mitigating climate change. He also spoke of the need to ensure consistency between the pace that is set, and the tim... Read more

Glacial melt - impending disaster?

April 30 2009
 The world's glaciers are continuing to melt away with the latest official figures showing record losses, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) announced last year.  Prof. Wilfried Haeberli, of Zurich University said: "The latest figures are part of what appears to be an accelerating trend with no apparent end in sight.""This continues the trend in accelerated ice loss during the past two an... Read more

A mandate too far....?

October 08 2008
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) met in Santiago, Chile, in June of this year to discuss, amongst other things, the survival status of a number of species of whales and porpoises. The western North Pacific Gray whale, Dall's and Vaquita porpoises, and some species of dolphin were singled out as being particularly vulnerable, and the importance of establishing whale sanctuaries and i... Read more

Eating Babies

April 16 2008
Bully-boy tactics from Russia cut no ice with Ukraine’s newly elected Prime Minister, Yulia Tymoshenko. The elegant politician, re-elected at the end of last year to the premiership of her country, two and a half months after the elections, having fallen out with the President in 2005, has been flagging up her plans to make her country modern, economically sound and a likely candidate for E... Read more

No change in biofuels policy, despite critics

March 13 2008
The European Commission has indicated that there will be no change in biofuels policy, despite increasing concerns that production will lead to a shortage in food supply. Speaking in Brussels, the Agriculture Commissioner, Mariann Fischer Boel, said that “no policy U-turns lie ahead”, despite criticisms of EU targets, and that such targets were “European Union policy for a reason... Read more

Biofuels drive food prices

January 22 2008
In what is reported as a last minute shoehorn arrangement the president of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso will present to the European Parliament, Wednesday, eagerly awaited proposals on energy and climate change.This is a masterful understatement: the European Commission’s biofuels targets have been slammed by no less than three scientific studies and are increasingly regarded... Read more

Biofuel disaster

January 18 2008
EU Biofuels a disasterAs this publication said in July last year the European Union’s biofuels policy, eagerly signed up to by ministers at their meeting the previous March, is a disaster.Now, thanks to Friends of the Earth and BirdLife International who obtained a leaked report of the EU’s Joint Research Council our story has been officially confirmed.The two NGOs describe the repor... Read more

Climate conference sparks internal debate

April 17 2007
Parliament this week hosts yet one more conference on the topical subject of climate change, this time, however, with a difference. Unlike the usual Parliament-sponsored events, this one carries the disclaimer that the “views expressed may not be those of the European Parliament”, and the organiser and host of the conference is noted Eurosceptic MEP Roger Helmer. The Counter-Consensual... Read more