Higher 2030 EU climate target would lead to “challenging” debate on German goals

Raising the EU greenhouse gas reduction target to between 50 and 55 percent – a European Commission proposal that Chancellor Angela Merkel has welcomed – will mean a “challenging” debate about tightening Germany’s national sector targets, Oliver Geden, head of the EU research division at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), told Tagesspiegel Background. “This is not going to be fun for the government then in office,” said Geden, who expects the current national target of about -55.5 percent to be raised to -60 percent or more. While the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) stipulates the emissions reduction targets for the energy and industry sectors, the Effort Sharing scheme regulates other sectors and assigns targets to each member state. The distribution of these contributions had been decided in “tough negotiations” among EU countries and no one is keen on making changes to the allocation, said Brigitte Knopf, secretary general of the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change (MCC).

At the 11th Petersberg Climate Dialogue, Merkel came out in favour of increasing the EU target, saying that carbon pricing would be her instrument of choice. In earlier statements, the chancellor had called on other member states to do more and said she expected “very exciting consultations” among member states. “The rest remains for the negotiations; I will not use my trump cards too early,” she said.