The European Union agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 compared to 1990 levels following a two-day summit in Brussels and negotiations that lasted well into the night.
The 55% goal is an increase from an earlier deal to cut emissions by 40% in the same time frame.
“Europe is the leader in the fight against climate change,” European Council President Charles Michel tweeted after the deal was reached. “This was a marathon European Council … with a great result for Europe! We now have the means to power forward our climate & digital strategies for the 21st century. Unity doesn’t just happen, it has to be worked for.”
Europe is the leader in the fight against climate change.
We decided to cut our greenhouse gas emissions of at least 55% by 2030. #EUCO pic.twitter.com/XfoCacHoq0
— Charles Michel (@eucopresident) December 11, 2020
The news comes ahead of a United Nations meeting this weekend on climate hosted by the United Kingdom and France. U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson has already announced a number of ambitious environmental goals for the U.K., including cutting its own emissions by at least 68% by the end of the decade.
Like the EU’s massive budget and stimulus package that was approved on Thursday, the climate deal gridlock was caused primarily by Poland and Hungary — joined this time by the Czech Republic. The three Eastern European states are still far more reliant on coal-powered energy than Western Europe, according to the Associated Press, and argued that it was “unfair that all member states should be submitted to the same ambition without considering their respective energy mixes.”
Poland did not commit to the EU’s 2050 climate neutrality goal in 2019 either.
The agreement was reached by making the 55% target a collective target that averages the emissions of each member of the economic bloc rather than a goal each state much reach individually. “Leaders agreed that the cuts will be first achieved in sectors and countries where there is still plenty of room for improvement,” the Belgian prime minister’s office said in a statement.
