‘Yellow vests’ protests in France are blow to climate activists

The so-called ‘yellow vests’ protest against higher taxes on fuel and heating oil in France are a major disappointment for all who advocate a tax on greenhouse gases to curb emissions, Andreas Mihm writes in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. “Forging a CO2-price coalition in Berlin will be even more difficult now,” he says. Environment minister Svenja Schulze already sought to assuage critics by saying that any reform of taxes and levies in the energy sector would have to account for “social needs and redistributive effects”, to maintain public support for climate action.  At the same time, Ottmar Edenhofer of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) as well as other climate researchers warns that “European partners must not abandon [French President Emmanuel] Macron now” since “our climate targets are unattainable without a CO2 price.”

Read the CLEW article Fear of public backlash and complexity hold back German CO2 price for background.