More and more European leaders are waking up to the impossibility of achieving badly thought-out green targets—not to mention the immense costs of achieving them. But Brussels, as on other issues, is proving difficult to budge, holding tightly even to the most unrealistic aims.
The Commission’s climate chief, Wopke Hoekstra, this week celebrated the bloc being “well on track” to cutting emissions by 54% by 2030 compared to 1990—consumers (and farmers, and industry leaders, and so on) be damned. Emissions are said to have already fallen by 37%.
Energy commissioner Dan Jorgensen also said “we have reasons to be proud,” but stressed that “we cannot be satisfied.”
We’ve come a long way, but we’re not where we need to be yet.
Indeed, Brussels appears never to be satisfied, always pushing—and, from some quarters, being pushed—to take a more extreme approach to the environment.
However, officials may soon face reality as previously compliant member states, under pressure from voters and businesses, begin to question the cost and unattainability of ambitious goals.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni struck a very different tone on Tuesday, saying it was an “an act of responsibility” to challenge “the ideological approach to energy transition.”
Over the years, enormous damage has been done, without the promised benefits arriving. We need the courage to say it and to put reality back at the center.
Contestare e correggere l’approccio ideologico alla transizione energetica è un atto di responsabilità. Negli anni sono stati prodotti enormi danni, senza che arrivassero i vantaggi promessi. Serve il coraggio di dirlo e di rimettere al centro la realtà. pic.twitter.com/m3xXoDiZ7u
In the UK, too, where the impressive rise of the populist Reform party is serving as an example to other movements across Europe, Nigel Farage said on Tuesday that if he is able to form a government after the next general election, he will scrap net zero altogether. This, he said, would save the taxpayer an incredible £45 billion (€53.6bn) each year.
Leader of Reform UK Nigel Farage says that if his party wins the next general election they will scrap Net Zero and the 'DEI agenda'. https://t.co/TC2ROCL7wW
Michael Curzon is a news writer for europeanconservative.com based in England’s Midlands. He is also Editor of Bournbrook Magazine, which he founded in 2019, and previously wrote for London’s Express Online. His Twitter handle is @MichaelCurzon_.
