Download this issueThe Energy Efficiency Plan is "an empty shell"
On 8 March 2011 the European Commission published its Energy Efficiency Plan. Environmental NGOs hoped that this plan would become an important instrument for a legally binding 20 per cent energy efficiency target for the EU until 2020. According to Climate Action Network Europe (CAN Europe) the main firm measures proposed are:
- a binding target to double the refurbishment rate of public buildings
- new energy efficiency criteria for public procurement
- a requirement for member states to reduce the legal obstacles that result in split incentives e.g. for building renovation
- enhanced requirements for combined heat and power to be use
- a requirement for member states to establish energy-saving obligation schemes for energy companies
- mandatory energy audits for large companies
- an extended Ecodesign workplan
Some of these are good ideas says CAN Europe, but very little detail is given, and a lot looks likely to be left to the discretion of member states. CAN Europe therefore calls it "an empty shell of an energy efficiency plan" that lists many measures that are already part of business as usual, and contains very little in the way of hard or concrete measures.
Reinhold Pape
Source: Energy Efficiency and Savings: Clearing the fog, Everything you always wanted to know but were afraid to ask about Europe's First Energy Source March 2011
Europe should take an integrated approach to nitrogen management. This is the main message of the European Nitrogen Assessment, a new report launched during the "Nitrogen and Global Change" conference, in Edinburgh (UK) from 11–14 April, 2011.
The number of premature deaths in Europe caused by air pollutant emissions from international shipping is estimated to amount to approximately 49,500 in the year 2000, and rise to 53,200 in 2020.
There are sufficient resources to provide the world with renewable energy. The main constraint on development is public policy, that is the main message in a new IPCC report.
A handful of measures targeting black carbon and tropospheric ozone can reduce future global warming by 0.5°C, according to a UNEP and WMO report.
Germany's lignite power plants still dominate the CO2 list. Serbia is registering emissions for the first time and enters both the NOx list and the SO2 list.
Mercury emissions from coal-fired plants can be cut by well over 90 per cent, but this fact has so far been neglected in ongoing talks for a revised Heavy Metals Protocol.
As no revision of the European Air Quality legislation is planned until at least 2013, the EU has said it will focus on source-oriented legislation in the meantime. Often neglected in comparison to regulations concerning road vehicles, the so-called "non-road" sector, which includes locomotive ..
"Curbing mobility is not an option," says the European Commission in a new roadmap for the transport sector, expressing a view that immediately sparked criticism.
Prompt action is required to further reduce particulate matter, ground-level ozone, and nitrogen dioxide – an EU clean air strategy should be adopted in 2013.
Significant environmental improvements can be achieved while additional costs still stay well below 0.1 per cent of GDP. Moreover, health benefits alone outweigh the costs by ten times or more.
