what consequences for the “Green Deal”?

What will be the impact of the vote on this package of measures which should allow Europe to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050? NGOs are worried that the “Green deal” was already being undermined before the elections.

The collapse of environmentalists and the rise of the far right in the European Parliament call into question the future of Brussels’ environmental policy. The group of Greens and the European Free Alliance only obtained 52 seats in Strasbourg and thus lost its place as fourth political force. As a result, the fate of the Green Deal launched in 2019 by Brussels is darkening, causing concern among environmental NGOs.

It’s mathematical, the European Parliament is less green today than it was yesterday. The Greens lost 20 seats when the two far-right groups gained 13. There remains the central group strengthened by the vote: the EPP of the current President of the Commission. Its choices will determine the future of European environmental policy, analyzes Caroline François-Marsal, from the Climate Action Network.

“Everything will depend on the choice that the EPP will make, whether to seek majorities on the far right, or to keep the current majorities towards the liberals and socialists.”

Caroline François-Marsal, from the Climate Action Network

at franceinfo

“This choice will be decisive for the future of the Green deal”analyzed Carolone François-Marsal, “since the far-right parties have notably positioned themselves against this European climate package.”

The far right has systematically voted against the measures of the Green Deal, this package of measures which should allow Europe to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050: directive on imported deforestation, acceleration of renewable energies, ban on sale of new thermal cars by 2035. On this last point, as on others, convergences have emerged in recent months with part of the traditional right of the EPP, which worries the NGOs. There is also the rejection last November of a European regulation to halve pesticides by 2030, or more recently the revision of the Common Agricultural Policy with significantly reduced environmental requirements.

The Green Pact was therefore clearly weakened even before the elections of the last few days, because the context has changed since the launch of this “Green deal” in 2019. At the time, it was the Greens’ breakthrough in the European elections and we saw young people in the streets every week behind Greta Thunberg. Since then, there has been the war in Ukraine, inflation and even the agricultural crisis. One of the emblematic examples of this reversal is the law on the restoration of nature to “repair” 20% of land and marine spaces by 2030, a central measure of the “biodiversity” component of the Green Deal. However, the parliament approved it at the last minute, but since then, there has been no majority among the 27 for formal adoption. EU environment ministers are expected to decide on its future next Monday.