I hope you have had a good and, above all, refreshed start to the new year! You don’t have to be a prophet to predict that the coming months will be just as nerve-wracking politically as the past few. Donald Trump will be sworn in as POTUS again on Jan. 20, while his courtier Elon Musk, aka “Kekius Maximus”, will likely spend the remaining time insulting German and British politicians.
The EU leaders will have to try to keep a clear head despite the noise. At the turn of the year, Poland took over the rotating presidency of the Council, greeted with warm words by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Foreign Affairs Commissioner Kaja Kallas. Hardly anyone in Brussels is weeping for Hungary’s past presidency of the Council: Viktor Orbán and his followers abused the stage too obviously for their own interests instead of being a fair broker of interests.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will have to prepare important decisions in the coming weeks, together with von der Leyen, Kallas, and the new Council President António Costa. Two weeks after Trump’s inauguration, the EU heads of state and government will come together for a closed meeting, as you can read in our date preview: Support for Ukraine, European defense, Trump’s tariffs, and the EU’s own competitiveness – all of these topics require important decisions to be made. At the same time, however, the upcoming presidential election in Poland in May will tie Tusk’s hands, as you can read in Lukas Knigge’s Analysis.
However, the turn of the year also brought good news for the growing together of Europe: 18 years after joining the EU, Romania and Bulgaria are now fully-fledged members of the Schengen zone. Austria had lifted its veto in December, making possible the “historic moment” that Bulgarian Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev now spoke of.
I wish you a healthy new year – and strong nerves!
The EU is unlikely to take a leading role in international efforts to improve climate action in the new year either. The unambitious Hungarian Council Presidency will be followed by the Polish Presidency. The national situation in Poland threatens to delay important milestones in European climate policy such as the EU’s 2040 climate target – possibly even into the second half of the year.
At the EU Environment Council in mid-December, the EU environment ministers once again discussed how much Europe wants to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 2040. No agreement was reached on the 2040 climate target, although the Commission had already tabled the offer of 90% fewer greenhouse gases than in 1990 in February 2024.
The EU is also likely to miss the international deadline for the next climate target (NDC) for 2035, which it has to submit to the UN by the end of February. The Commission makes no secret of this, but without an agreement between the countries, its hands are tied.
The European NDC for 2035 depends on the EU’s 2040 climate target. A line will be drawn between the targets for 2030 (55% GHG reduction) and 2040, and the 2035 target will be read off from this, as announced by EU Climate Action Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra at COP29 in Baku. If the EU states agree on a 90 percent GHG reduction by 2040, the NDC for 2035 would be 72.5 percent.
It would be an ambitious goal. The only question is whether and, above all, when it will come. “A clear and early signal from the EU regarding climate targets for the period after 2030 would put pressure on other governments, including China, to speed up the transition and give investors certainty,” says Marc Weissgerber, Managing Director of the Berlin office of the think tank E3G.
Europe is lagging behind in the G20 timetable. Brazil, the UK, Canada and even the USA have already announced their NDC for 2035. According to observers, even China is ready to present its NDC but wants to link it to the announcement of the European target. The lack of agreement between the EU states on the 2040 target therefore also has an impact on China, which is highly relevant in terms of climate policy.
The most important key figures of the previous NDCs for 2035 at a glance:
There was only an exchange of ideas at the EU Environment Council in December. The Hungarian Council Presidency wanted to know from the member states how climate legislation could be simplified in order to place less of a burden on companies and what basic prerequisites (“enabling conditions”) need to be created for the new climate target. Almost the same debate had already been held under Belgian Council leadership six months ago, but not much has happened since then.
No agreement was even sought at the Council meetings of ministers or at the summits of heads of state and government. Even at the end of June, when the heads of state adopted the so-called Strategic Agenda up to 2029, climate policy was only dealt with in passing. At the EU summit in December, the topic was left out despite pressure from civil society to agree on future climate targets.
“The EU is now running out of time,” says Weissgerber. Weissgerber fears that the elections in Germany, Poland and Romania could probably postpone an agreement on the path to climate neutrality until the second half of 2025 or later. He sees it as a “missed opportunity” to make a clear commitment to climate policy leadership after the elections in the USA and COP29.
Germany is also failing to live up to its claim to be the EU’s climate policy leader, despite paying lip service to the idea. This is not only due to the former FDP participation in the government, which put the brakes on climate policy, as the German government has still not taken a clear position.
Berlin is simply not in a hurry, observers report. The European election campaign, the reorganization of the EU executive, and the Hungarian Council Presidency are slowing things down. The calculation is that an agreement will be reached in the new year. Although the EU will miss the UN deadline, the NDC will be ambitious. This has long been on the back burner, as the next Polish Council Presidency is itself highly skeptical of a 90 percent target for 2040.
The country would have to take the lead in negotiating the goal as chair of the member states, but at the same time has completely different problems. An extremely important presidential election is due to take place in Poland in May. The outcome will decide whether Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s citizens’ coalition will have more room for maneuver or whether it will have to continue to deal with a president from the right-wing nationalist PiS party.
There will certainly not be a climate election campaign, as Tusk’s camp is also questioning new climate action targets and fears additional social burdens in particular. In order not to make himself vulnerable to the PiS, the issue is therefore unlikely to play a role even among pro-Europeans.
It is therefore questionable whether it will even be possible to reach an agreement on the EU’s 2040 climate target in the first half of 2025. Even supporters of an ambitious EU climate policy agree that an election victory for pro-European forces in Poland is more important than an agreement on a 90% reduction in greenhouse gases by February.
I hope you have had a good and, above all, refreshed start to the new year! You don’t have to be a prophet to predict that the coming months will be just as nerve-wracking politically as the past few. Donald Trump will be sworn in as POTUS again on Jan. 20, while his courtier Elon Musk, aka “Kekius Maximus”, will likely spend the remaining time insulting German and British politicians.
The EU leaders will have to try to keep a clear head despite the noise. At the turn of the year, Poland took over the rotating presidency of the Council, greeted with warm words by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Foreign Affairs Commissioner Kaja Kallas. Hardly anyone in Brussels is weeping for Hungary’s past presidency of the Council: Viktor Orbán and his followers abused the stage too obviously for their own interests instead of being a fair broker of interests.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will have to prepare important decisions in the coming weeks, together with von der Leyen, Kallas, and the new Council President António Costa. Two weeks after Trump’s inauguration, the EU heads of state and government will come together for a closed meeting, as you can read in our date preview: Support for Ukraine, European defense, Trump’s tariffs, and the EU’s own competitiveness – all of these topics require important decisions to be made. At the same time, however, the upcoming presidential election in Poland in May will tie Tusk’s hands, as you can read in Lukas Knigge’s Analysis.
However, the turn of the year also brought good news for the growing together of Europe: 18 years after joining the EU, Romania and Bulgaria are now fully-fledged members of the Schengen zone. Austria had lifted its veto in December, making possible the “historic moment” that Bulgarian Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev now spoke of.
I wish you a healthy new year – and strong nerves!
The EU is unlikely to take a leading role in international efforts to improve climate action in the new year either. The unambitious Hungarian Council Presidency will be followed by the Polish Presidency. The national situation in Poland threatens to delay important milestones in European climate policy such as the EU’s 2040 climate target – possibly even into the second half of the year.
At the EU Environment Council in mid-December, the EU environment ministers once again discussed how much Europe wants to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 2040. No agreement was reached on the 2040 climate target, although the Commission had already tabled the offer of 90% fewer greenhouse gases than in 1990 in February 2024.
The EU is also likely to miss the international deadline for the next climate target (NDC) for 2035, which it has to submit to the UN by the end of February. The Commission makes no secret of this, but without an agreement between the countries, its hands are tied.
The European NDC for 2035 depends on the EU’s 2040 climate target. A line will be drawn between the targets for 2030 (55% GHG reduction) and 2040, and the 2035 target will be read off from this, as announced by EU Climate Action Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra at COP29 in Baku. If the EU states agree on a 90 percent GHG reduction by 2040, the NDC for 2035 would be 72.5 percent.
It would be an ambitious goal. The only question is whether and, above all, when it will come. “A clear and early signal from the EU regarding climate targets for the period after 2030 would put pressure on other governments, including China, to speed up the transition and give investors certainty,” says Marc Weissgerber, Managing Director of the Berlin office of the think tank E3G.
Europe is lagging behind in the G20 timetable. Brazil, the UK, Canada and even the USA have already announced their NDC for 2035. According to observers, even China is ready to present its NDC but wants to link it to the announcement of the European target. The lack of agreement between the EU states on the 2040 target therefore also has an impact on China, which is highly relevant in terms of climate policy.
The most important key figures of the previous NDCs for 2035 at a glance:
There was only an exchange of ideas at the EU Environment Council in December. The Hungarian Council Presidency wanted to know from the member states how climate legislation could be simplified in order to place less of a burden on companies and what basic prerequisites (“enabling conditions”) need to be created for the new climate target. Almost the same debate had already been held under Belgian Council leadership six months ago, but not much has happened since then.
No agreement was even sought at the Council meetings of ministers or at the summits of heads of state and government. Even at the end of June, when the heads of state adopted the so-called Strategic Agenda up to 2029, climate policy was only dealt with in passing. At the EU summit in December, the topic was left out despite pressure from civil society to agree on future climate targets.
“The EU is now running out of time,” says Weissgerber. Weissgerber fears that the elections in Germany, Poland and Romania could probably postpone an agreement on the path to climate neutrality until the second half of 2025 or later. He sees it as a “missed opportunity” to make a clear commitment to climate policy leadership after the elections in the USA and COP29.
Germany is also failing to live up to its claim to be the EU’s climate policy leader, despite paying lip service to the idea. This is not only due to the former FDP participation in the government, which put the brakes on climate policy, as the German government has still not taken a clear position.
Berlin is simply not in a hurry, observers report. The European election campaign, the reorganization of the EU executive, and the Hungarian Council Presidency are slowing things down. The calculation is that an agreement will be reached in the new year. Although the EU will miss the UN deadline, the NDC will be ambitious. This has long been on the back burner, as the next Polish Council Presidency is itself highly skeptical of a 90 percent target for 2040.
The country would have to take the lead in negotiating the goal as chair of the member states, but at the same time has completely different problems. An extremely important presidential election is due to take place in Poland in May. The outcome will decide whether Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s citizens’ coalition will have more room for maneuver or whether it will have to continue to deal with a president from the right-wing nationalist PiS party.
There will certainly not be a climate election campaign, as Tusk’s camp is also questioning new climate action targets and fears additional social burdens in particular. In order not to make himself vulnerable to the PiS, the issue is therefore unlikely to play a role even among pro-Europeans.
It is therefore questionable whether it will even be possible to reach an agreement on the EU’s 2040 climate target in the first half of 2025. Even supporters of an ambitious EU climate policy agree that an election victory for pro-European forces in Poland is more important than an agreement on a 90% reduction in greenhouse gases by February.
