ENVI and Fit for 55 +Energy Charter Trea • Table.Briefings

Dear reader,

From the Bavarian city of Elmau, where the G7 summit ended yesterday with an urgent appeal to China to convince Russia to end its invasion of Ukraine, we now head straight to Madrid, Spain, for the NATO summit. On the menu there: “Russian Salad”. The name of the dish made of peas, potatoes, carrots, and mayonnaise caused some confusion among attendees – after all, Russia is the common enemy at this summit. The summit itself started yesterday evening with an important announcement: Turkey has dropped its opposition to the NATO accession of Sweden and Finland.

In Luxembourg, the EU environment and climate ministers discussed their joint position on some crucial legislative proposals of the Fit for 55 package until late into the night. Only with great effort and willingness to compromise could a so-called package deal still be agreed upon in the end. Lukas Scheid stayed awake and analyzed the results of the Environment Council.

The Energy Charter Treaty will be reformed. Last week, the signatory states agreed on the fundamental contents. Speaking with Till Hoppe, Michael De Boeck, legal expert at the College of Europe in Bruges, explained where the real progress lies.

Your
Lisa-Martina Klein

Environment Council: late compromises on combustion engine phase-out, ETS and CBAM

By

Lukas Knigge

It was not an easy task from the start. A single general orientation of the Environment Council for five partly completely different legislative proposals of the Fit for 55 package – in the end, the position of the 27 member states now stands. This means that the trilogue negotiations with the EU Parliament can begin under the upcoming Czech Council presidency.

Combustion engine phase-out in 2035

The tightening of fleet emission limits for passenger cars and light commercial vehicles was the subject of tough wrangling right up to the end. But the agreement now actually means that only zero-emission vehicles will be allowed to be registered from 2035. However, the Commission is to review in 2026 whether plug-in hybrids or e-fuels could also contribute to achieving the targets. The prerequisite for this is that they do not emit any greenhouse gases, which is not yet technologically possible.

With the Council’s position, there is nothing standing in the way of phasing out the internal combustion engine, despite the trilogue still to come, since Parliament had also spoken out in favor of the phase-out date.

Almost coalition dispute over combustion engine phase-out

For a long time on Tuesday, it did not look like an agreement would be reached on the end of the internal combustion engine for passenger cars, partly because the German government did not quite want to find common ground. Environment Minister Steffi Lemke and Finance Minister Christian Lindner made different statements on Germany’s common position during the course of the day. For a short time, it even looked like a tangible and, above all, public coalition dispute.

In the end, Chancellor Olaf Scholz intervened from afar and declared, while still at the G7 summit at Schloss Elmau, that the intention was to make it possible for cars to be registered in 2035 with e-fuels, for example. Shortly afterwards, a government spokesperson announced that the German government would agree to the compromise at the meeting of EU environment ministers in Luxembourg – but with a somewhat cryptic explanation.

The spokesperson explained that the EU Commission had agreed to submit a proposal outside the fleet limits on how vehicles powered exclusively by e-fuels could be registered even after 2035. According to the common understanding of the German government, this also applies to passenger cars and light commercial vehicles. However, the fleet limits apply to precisely those passenger cars and light commercial vehicles, which is why it is still not clear to what extent the German government believes e-fuels should still play a role after 2035.

Habeck gets his way with ETS and CBAM

A German compromise proposal to introduce a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) received much support and was eventually adopted. However, it provides for a slower meltdown of free allowances as protection against carbon leakage than envisaged by the Commission.

For example, free allocations would be reduced by 5 percentage points annually between 2026 and 2028, by 7.5 percentage points in 2029 and 2030, by 10 percentage points in 2031 and 2032, by 15 percentage points in 2033 and 2034, and by 20 percentage points in 2035. Consequently, in 2036, there would be no more free allowances. Initially, CBAM would only cover the electricity sector and the industrial sectors of cement, iron and steel, aluminum, and fertilizers.

Germany had also lobbied for, and ultimately won, a change in the benchmarks for industrial plants in free allocations. The benchmarks are the basis for calculating the amount of free allocations for the respective industries. They are based on the GHG emission intensity of a product (GHG emissions in tons per ton of product produced). The benchmarks are thus intended to reflect the performance of the top 10 percent of facilities covered by the ETS that manufacture the product.

This means that by using climate-friendly technologies, the benchmark increases, and plant operators are thus incentivized to use them – that’s the idea. However, German Economic Affairs Minister Robert Habeck had advocated not raising benchmarks in the years 2026 to 2030. The reason: If a company implements a more climate-friendly technology at one site, it makes it more expensive to operate its other older plants that still need to be replaced. According to Habeck, this creates a disincentive and has apparently convinced his counterparts.

The Council also agreed to include maritime emissions in the scope of the ETS, as well as the phasing out of free allocation for aviation by 2027.

The introduction of a second emissions trading system for building heating and road transport (ETS 2) was also part of the French package deal and is thus also supported by the member states. However, the social compensation for the additional costs of ETS 2 was the subject of heated debate, with the Commission estimating the size of the Social Climate Fund at over €72 billion. Too much for some richer member states.

The compromise proposal of the French finally amounted to €59 billion, but even the concession was not enough for Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden, among others. Habeck still tried to push the size of the fund down to €48.5 billion. However, he was unsuccessful.

There was also a dispute about a volatility mechanism for the ETS, which is intended to prevent price jumps. Article 29a gives member states the option of selling allowances from the market stability reserve if their price is three times higher than the average price in the two preceding years for more than six consecutive months.

Some countries that suffered particularly from price increases wanted earlier and stronger instruments. Richer member states – including Germany – were firmly opposed to this but ultimately agreed to the French compromise. This now provides for 29a to take effect at 2.5 times the average price and for 75 million CO2 allowances to be released from the market stability reserve.

Agreement also on ESR and LULUCF

Less controversial but also part of the package: the Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR) and land use, land-use change, and forestry (LULUCF). For ESR, member states agreed on an EU-wide target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent compared to 2005 for sectors not covered by the ETS. For LULUCF, the Council confirmed an overall target of 310 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent for net removals in the LULUCF sector in 2030.

‘Once you’re in, you can’t get out’

By

Till Hoppe

Mr. De Boeck, what is the modernization of the Energy Charter Treaty for you: piecemeal or real reform?

We must wait for the final text, but from what is known it is a major reform at least in one respect: It is confirmed that intra-EU application of the dispute resolution provision of Article 26 will be taken out. This is something the EU Commission has been fighting for a very long time and that has been considered absolutely crucial by the European Court of Justice in its recent case law.

How relevant are these disputes between a European investor and another member state?

Extremely relevant. Statistics are somewhat unreliable because of the confidential nature of ISDS proceedings, but the Energy Charter treaty is one of the most used investment instruments by investors. About 50 percent of the intra-EU caseload of ISDS is brought under the Energy Charter Treaty. One reason why the Achmea ruling by the ECJ in 2018 was seen as a bombshell ruling by arbitration practitioners was because it also foreclosed in a single judgment a significant part of the investment arbitration market.

In the decision, the ECJ ruled that the arbitration clause in the bilateral investment treaty between the Netherlands and Slovakia was incompatible with EU law.

The ruling was in fact rejected by all the investment tribunals to date except one very recently.

How so?

Investment tribunals dealing with disputes consider their jurisdictional competence from the perspective of international law only. You have to make a distinction between the international validity of a treaty and its EU law compatibility. The first depends on whether it was lawfully concluded under international law. The second notion is whether this treaty respects EU primary law. The ECJ ruled in the Achmea case that if the EU or Member States conclude a treaty that includes dispute settlement provisions, then special considerations apply: If the dispute is liable to relate to the interpretation or application of EU law, only the ECJ is jurisdictionally competent unless there are some very strict conditions fulfilled. But international investment tribunals have always looked at the jurisdictional competence from the perspective of international law. All the ECJ’s arguments on compatibility with EU law are not relevant here in their view.

Negotiations are the only solution

Because this view fits well with their business interests?

In fact, I also don’t think that case-law of the ECJ has an impact on the international validity of a treaty – it’s two very different things. But that leaves us in a very difficult spot. The Energy Charter Treaty is very strictly lock-in – once you’re in, you can’t get out. Neither can you use any other treaty to supervene the Energy Charter Treaty. The infamous Art i cle 16 ECT says that you have to apply the most beneficial rule for the investor. The only answer seems to be to continue negotiating with the other parties to get a modification of the treaty.

Activists and some member states are calling for withdrawal from the Energy Charter Treaty.

The sunset clause is very clear: If you withdraw, you will be locked-in for another 20 years. There’s no argument about it. Some claim that the EU Member States could opt for a specific treaty among themselves. But I don’t think this is feasible. A successive treaty to the same subject matter is prohibited in Article 16 of the Energy Carta Treaty. A modification of the existing treaty would need to get consent from a quorum in the EC conference that you won’t have even if all EU Member States vote in favor. That’s why the only reasonable way forward, legally speaking, is renegotiation within the ECT ministerial conference.

What the EU has achieved in the renegotiation is a carve-out for fossil fuel-related investments from investment protection for existing investments after 10 years and for new investments made after 15 August 2023 with limited exceptions. Environmentalists claim that’s too little too late.

That’s actually an acceleration by ten years compared to a withdrawal that would trigger the sunset clause. I think that’s a win.

Allay most concerns

The modernization of the Energy Charter Treaty also allows for some clarification on the right to regulate vis-a-vis investments, in order to better protect legitimate public policy objectives.

The new generation of free trade and investment agreements concluded by the EU already contains more qualified investment protection standards in order to protect the regulatory margin of the states. If the provisions in the modernized ECT are well drafted, they could assuage most of the concerns. But we will have to wait for the final legal text.

There are many critical voices.

For some environmentalist activists and legal commentators, no reform will ever be enough, because in their view the protection of investors through international law is already a bridge too far. I think we have to find a balance: Promoting investment through a stable investment climate that puts some limit on the behavior of the state – which is not always an angel either, whether intentionally or through unfortunate circumstances – and on the other hand by clearly setting out that investment protection is not a get out of jail free card either for environmental or social misconduct.

And this balance has been achieved in the renegotiating of the ECT?

It’s difficult to say on the basis of the agreement in principle, we will have to see the final text, though in the balance of things, the modernization of the ECT in line with the more qualified investment protection standards in the new generation of EU free trade and investment agreements, is certainly a step in the right direction.

NATO: Turkey paves the way for Sweden and Finland

Turkey has dropped its opposition to the accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO. During the NATO summit in Madrid, Ankara will support the invitation to the two Nordic countries to become alliance members, Finland’s President Sauli Niinistö stated. A memorandum to this effect was signed by the foreign ministers of the three countries after a meeting with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Sweden’s Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The joint memorandum would underline the commitment of Finland, Sweden and Turkey to ensure their full support against threats to each other’s security, the Finnish president’s statement said. According to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, this includes further legal changes, a crackdown on PKK activities and the signing of an extradition agreement with Turkey.

Finland and Sweden are not yet NATO members, but they are close partners of the defense alliance. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, however, triggered intense debates about such membership in the two countries, which have so far been militarily non-aligned. On May 18, they both applied for NATO membership – in the hope that the procedure leading up to eventual accession could be finalized as quickly as possible.

NATO had already announced on Monday that it would increase the NATO Response Force from 40,000 soldiers to well over 300,000. According to German Minister of Defense Christine Lambrecht, Germany will contribute 15,000 soldiers. In addition, the Federal Republic will contribute about 35 aircraft and 20 ships. Lambrecht also announced Germany would deliver three additional self-propelled howitzers to Ukraine. dpa/rtr

G7: China should increase pressure on Russia

The G7 countries have called on China to urge Russia to end its invasion of Ukraine. Beijing should put pressure on Moscow to withdraw troops from Ukraine immediately and without conditions, the G7 reported. In the G7 Leaders’ Communiqué of the three-day summit, the G7 countries also expressed concern about the situation in the East and South China Seas and spoke out against unilateral attempts to change the status quo by force or coercion. This time, the final declaration of the G7 summit contained almost an entire page just on China policy.

The G7 countries expressed particular concern about the human rights situation in China. China should respect universal human rights and guarantee basic freedoms – including in Tibet and Xinjiang. Accordingly, the G7 countries want to take stronger joint action against forced labor in China. For example, products made under forced labor are to be excluded from global supply chains. The move is aimed primarily at China, which uses forced labor on a large scale in Xinjiang province, according to a fact sheet published on the White House website. The G7 also agreed to take united action against unfair economic practices by the People’s Republic.

Reduce dependencies on China

With regard to China’s protectionist economic policy, the G7 complain about non-transparent and market-distorting measures by the People’s Republic. The seven major industrialized nations have agreed to continue to exchange views on this and to develop joint countermeasures outside the G7 forum. They want to reduce economic dependencies on China and arm themselves against coercive economic measures, according to the final document. The EU states are currently working on an instrument against economic coercion (China.Table reported).

With regard to the situation in Hong Kong, the G7 call on China to fulfill the commitments made in the Sino-British Joint Declaration and Basic Law and to ensure Hong Kong’s rights, freedoms, and autonomy. What is needed, they said, is to cooperate with China on common global challenges such as climate change and biodiversity loss. nib/fpe/rtr

Melnyk: ‘Taxonomy favors Russian gas’

Ukraine’s Ambassador to Germany Andrij Melnyk has urged the European Parliament to reject the second Delegated Act of EU taxonomy. Shortly before the Parliament’s final vote on the legal act, Melnyk addressed a letter to German MEP Viola von Cramon (Greens), referring to the “security policy significance” of the vote.

According to Melnyk, Russia “generates significant revenues from the sale of natural gas to the European Union”. The European Commission’s current taxonomy proposal would promote the construction of gas-fired power plants, while LNG terminals would be considered ineligible – meaning Russian gas would be “clearly favored”. This would be a “fatal signal” amid Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the letter says.

Next week, at its meeting in Strasbourg, the Parliament will decide whether to include natural gas and nuclear power projects in the taxonomy via a delegated act, thereby labeling them as sustainable. Green and Socialist MEPs had raised objections. The Environment and Economics Committees already voted in favor of the objection in mid-June (Europe.Table reported). Whether the plenary will also support the veto is uncertain, despite a large cross-party alliance against the legislation. leo

Kremlin: Gazprom could change contracts in the event of gas price cap

Russia threatens to change gas supply contracts by energy giant Gazprom if a price cap on Russian gas is introduced. “It depends on the direction, depends on the decision taken by Gazprom. Probably, they may raise a question of changing the terms of existing contracts, changing the price,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.

The heads of state and government of the G7 countries had previously agreed to consider possible price caps for Russian oil and gas. This would limit the Russian government’s ability to finance its invasion of Ukraine.

Peskov did not specify whether the changes would involve an adjustment of the contracts to the proposed caps or a complete revision of the terms of the contract. Gazprom was initially unavailable for comment, as was the Finance Ministry. When asked how the G7 proposals to cap prices might affect the state budget, Peskov said, “We don’t yet know what it is about.”

Although Russia earns more than it did prior to the invasion of Ukraine given skyrocketing energy prices, the country expects to run a budget deficit of two percent of gross domestic product this year as it increases social welfare and business support to offset sanctions. According to Natalia Orlova, Chief Economist at Alfa Bank, even with this projected budget deficit, Russia would require an oil price of $100 per barrel this year to balance its budget.

According to several studies, Germany would be particularly affected by a sudden stop in Russian gas supplies. This could cost 12.7 percent of economic output, according to a Prognos study published on Tuesday for the Bavarian Business Association (VBW). According to a ZEW study, Germany and the Netherlands, in particular, are losing competitiveness in Europe due to particularly high increases in electricity rates. France, Switzerland, the USA and Japan are significantly less affected. However, according to the leading research institutes, the risk of a supply shortage of natural gas in the event of a supply stop has recently decreased. rtr

Poland: EU targets for Ukraine grain exports unrealistic

The European Union’s targets for exporting 20 million tons of grain from Ukraine by the end of July are unrealistic, according to Poland. The reason is that there is too little progress in solving logistics problems, Polish Agriculture Minister Henryk Kowalczyk told Reuters on Tuesday.

“Had we started moving forward in mid-May, it would have been very difficult, but we could have been closer.” Kowalczyk particularly criticized the EU for not providing Poland with enough help in the form of equipment such as silos or containers. The EU Commission was initially unavailable for comment.

Poland shares a long land border with Ukraine. The country stores large quantities of grain that cannot be exported because of the Russian blockade on the Black Sea. The EU Commission has proposed facilitating land transport. However, only a fraction of the quantities that otherwise leave Ukraine by sea can be transported over land.

One factor further complicating the process is the difference in track gauge for trains between the EU and the Eastern European country. The grain is to be offloaded into mobile silos at the border or on a Ukrainian line that stretches 400 kilometers to Poland and then transported west via European trains.

Meanwhile, Italy’s Prime Minister Mario Draghi said at Tuesday’s G7 meeting that grain exports from Ukraine may soon resume by sea. This could alleviate the bottlenecks that affect poor countries in particular.

At the end of the G7 meeting, Draghi said that sea mines around Ukrainian ports would not have to be completely cleared and that there were “corridors” that could allow cargo ships to operate. A final green light from the Kremlin was required for exports to resume, and this “should come soon,” Draghi told reporters. rtr

CER Directive: agreement in trilogue

Negotiators from the European Parliament and the Council reached an agreement with the Commission on Tuesday in the trilogue on the revision of the Critical Entity Directive (CER). The CER Directive is to replace the previous critical infrastructure directive of 2008. CER is closely related to the Network and Information Security (NIS) Directive, whose revision under the acronym NIS2 was agreed upon by European negotiators in mid-May.

With CER, member states must develop a strategy to protect against outages in more sectors, in addition to making risk impact assessments mandatory. In addition, member states must in the future – believe it or not – also enable practical enforcement of their rules and impose penalties for non-compliance by affected companies. This will raise the rules to a common minimum level across Europe.

“Against the backdrop of the pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine, securing Europe’s critical infrastructure has become a top priority,” said EP Vice-President and negotiator Michal Šimečka (Renew/Slovakia). “The new Directive will ensure the provision of essential services such as energy, transport, water and healthcare while minimizing the impact of natural and man-made incidents,” said EU Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson.

Among other things, the threshold values above which companies are to be classified as critical were disputed. In addition, the negotiators argued about how exactly critical infrastructures of cross-border or pan-European significance should be dealt with. Also disputed was the extent to which operators and authorities should be equally responsible for risk impact assessment. The BDI, for example, had generally welcomed the CER, but also called for a common methodology for impact assessment. fst

Luxembourg data protection regulator introduces GDPR-CARPA certification

In the future, Luxembourg-based data processors will be able to subject themselves to a certification mechanism. This is intended to certify highly GDPR-compliant data processing.

At a conference on Tuesday, the Luxembourg data protection supervisory authority Commission nationale pour la protection des données (CNPD) presented its GDPR-CARPA mechanism. This makes the Grand Duchy’s data protection regulator the first supervisory authority to introduce a corresponding certification. The General Data Protection Regulation explicitly provides for this option in Article 42. The Luxembourg certification scheme involves the fulfillment of specific obligations arising from the GDPR, which comprise a total of 59 pages of regulations and interpretations.

The certification is apparently primarily intended to address Luxembourg’s strong financial services sector. This sector is considered to be particularly experienced in regulation and certification mechanisms. The CNDP reports that it has been working “audit professionals” in its development since 2018 “to determine the value of, as well as the type of GDPR certification that could be useful in the Luxembourgish ecosystem.”

According to the CNPD, the relevant standards for certification are the ISAE 3000 standard for the audit procedure, ISCQ1 for the quality control of audit bodies and ISO 17065 for licensing of certification entities, which the CNPD itself is responsible for in Luxembourg. The certification scheme is intended to meet the requirements for ISAE 3000 Type 2 reports and can thus be seamlessly integrated into the financial world standards.

In February, the joint committee of the European Data Protection Supervisor demanded improvements from the Luxembourg colleagues in order to prevent a fragmentation of the GDPR interpretation. In May, the Luxembourg data protection supervisory authority then decided to launch GDPR-CARPA. fst

Temporary deal: fast access for investigators to digital evidence

Investigators within the European Union are to be granted easier access to e-mails and chat messages from other EU countries to prosecute serious crimes. After more than four years of negotiations, MEP and EU negotiators agreed on key elements for investigators’ access to electronic evidence on Tuesday, as both sides announced.

The remaining items are to be negotiated by the negotiators over the coming weeks. Subsequently, EU member states and the European Parliament still have to approve the agreement. The Parliament’s chief negotiator, Birgit Sippel (SPD), spoke of a paradigm shift in police and judicial cooperation: “For the first time, national investigating authorities will be able to directly request service providers in other EU member states to hand over or secure electronic evidence, with clear deadlines and uniform rules across the EU.”

Until now, investigators often had to wait a long time for data to be handed over. In the meantime, important evidence is often deleted. During the negotiations, Parliament managed to ensure that in the future, when requests are made for particularly sensitive data such as traffic data, the country of origin of the service must also be informed of the request.

The prerequisite for this is that the wanted individual does not live exclusively in the country that made the request and that the crime was not only committed there. The informed authority may then refuse to hand over the data in certain instances – for example, if there are concerns regarding fundamental rights in the requesting country, according to Sippel.

This approach also meets German concerns. In 2018, the former German government had voted against the position of the EU states because it would have allowed Polish or Hungarian investigators, for example, to request information from Telekom without the consent of German authorities. “We know that the principles of the rule of law are not equally upheld everywhere in the European Union. (…) That’s why we think the dual control principle is important,” said Katarina Barley, who was Minister of Justice at the time.

Another part of Tuesday’s agreement, according to the French EU presidency, calls for service providers to designate representatives responsible for responding to requests from authorities. dpa

Scotland: new independence referendum

The Scottish head of government, Nicola Sturgeon, wants her countrymen to vote again next fall on whether Scotland should become an independent state. A corresponding referendum on secession from the United Kingdom should take place on October 19, 2023, Sturgeon announced on Tuesday in the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh. “Now is the time to get Scotland on the right path – the path chosen by those who live her,” the politician said. “Now is the time for independence.” She declared that she will never allow “Scottish democracy to be a prisoner of Boris Johnson”.

Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that “now is not the time to be talking about another independence referendum”. However, the government would carefully consider Sturgeon’s proposal, his spokesman said on Tuesday.

In a referendum in 2014, a majority of Scots (55 percent) voted to remain in the United Kingdom. However, that was before Brexit, which the northernmost part of the country rejected by a clear majority (62 percent). The supporters of independence, therefore, hope that the situation will change in a new vote.

Such a vote would actually require the consent of the British government, which the government has so far rejected. However, if necessary, Sturgeon wants to design the vote in such a way that it can be held in a lawful manner even without this consent. Experts expect lawsuits and legal hurdles. dpa/rtr

German government pushes ahead with CETA

Following political agre ement, the German government now wants to quickly introduce the bill to ratify the free trade agreement with Canada in the German parliament. The corresponding bill was submitted to the departmental vote yesterday and is expected to be approved by the cabinet on Friday.

Last week, the parliamentary groups of the SPD, the Greens and the FDP agreed on the conditions under which Germany will be able to ratify the CETA agreement, which has been provisionally in force since 2017. These include once again specifying the provisions, in particular on investment protection, without having to dismantle the agreement.

To this end, the EU Commission is to concretize the substantive investment protection standards with Canada in the CETA Joint Committee in order to prevent state regulatory action from being undermined, for example in climate protection. The agreed standards would then also bind the arbitration court that decides in disputes. According to government sources, “initial positive signals have been received from Canada”.

The German coalition also hopes that the initiative will inject new momentum into EU trade policy. Currently, only 15 of the 27 member states have ratified CETA; other agreements, for example with the Mercosur states, are still awaiting approval from the Council and the European Parliament.

Aside from the CETA ratification bill, the coalition package includes two other components: support for the Commission’s push to add stronger sanctions to the sustainability chapters of trade agreements; and a position on modernizing the Energy Charter Treaty, although this has not yet been finalized. tho

Nature Restoration Law: positive impetus for the Green Deal

By Raphael Weyland

The proposal for the nature restoration law was originally planned for last November but was postponed several times due to pressure from the land user lobby, among others. The argument that we cannot afford to protect the environment in times of attack on Ukraine is wrong on several counts. In terms of time alone, a proposal that still has to go through the legislative process does not change the current circumstances. Moreover, the nature and climate crisis, unfortunately, continues unabated.

If we wanted to do something about food security, we should look at animal agriculture and the issue of biofuels. If we don’t start restoring ecosystems, the climate and nature crisis will hit even harder, threatening food security through soil erosion, missing pollinators, and more.

Regarding the Commission’s proposal, 15 percent of ecosystems were supposed to be restored to their natural state by 2020. Since the EU member states did not take sufficient measures, a more binding approach now follows. The fact that this is happening is very welcome. The proposed regulation represents the first major EU legislation for nature since the Habitats Directive came into force in 1992, apart from the Water Framework Directive relating to water bodies and the special invasive alien species regulation.

There is a need to improve the content of various parts of the proposal. For example, the measures planned for the agricultural landscape and for peatlands were weakened in the end. The enforceability of the proposal also leaves much to be desired.

Re-sharpening necessary

What does the proposed regulation provide for? First, Article 1, paragraph 2 contains an EU-wide target that renaturation measures should occur on 20 percent of the land by 2030. However, this target is not formulated in an enforcement-specific way. Articles 4 to 10 then contain time-bound sub-targets with renaturation targets for various ecosystems for the years 2030, 2040, and 2050. These are formulated partly in terms of area and partly in terms of measures.

In terms of impact, the sub-target applicable to terrestrial natural ecosystems is certainly among the most relevant. With regard to the sub-target for marine ecosystems, it should be clarified in the legislative process that the measures required to achieve the target can be implemented despite the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy. The requirement to restore a certain number of river kilometers is unclearly formulated.

The measures envisaged under the article for the agricultural landscape need to be tightened. This applies to species-rich landscape elements, for which the specific percentage figure has been deleted. The target of 10 percent at regional level contained in the EU biodiversity strategy should be decisive. The target for peatland restoration already does not include all former peatland areas. Moreover, the alternative regulation for peat cutting is particularly critical, as it could render the overall targets meaningless.

The last sub-goal relates to forest ecosystems and contains requirements for good practice – not protection – e.g., a certain proportion of deadwood. The targets are to be implemented through a national renaturation plan. In this respect, Germany must avoid mistakes from Natura 2000 implementation and aim for more effective control at the federal level from the outset – among other things, the planned action program for natural climate protection can provide suitable funding instruments.

Preliminary work on implementation should start promptly. Even if the EU regulation, which will then be directly applicable, is not expected to enter into force for another one to two years and the final details will not be known until then, basic questions can already be clarified now.

EUROPE.TABLE EDITORS

Till
Hoppe

Charlotte
Wirth

Falk
Steiner

Timo
Landenberger

Corinna
Visser

Lukas
Knigge

Eric
Bonse

Sarah
Schaefer

Manuel
Berkel

Lisa-Martina
Klein

Markus
Grabitz

Stephan
Israel

Claire
Stam