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In the first EU Parliament hearing since the US election, voices against the EU Green Deal from the right and far-right were louder than ever. Emboldened by President Trump’s rhetoric on climate change, MEPs lambasted Teresa Ribera – the new EU minister Minister for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge – claiming the Green Deal was equivalent to a “Taliban” policy and blaming it for the recent Spanish flood.
Despite the rightward tilt resulting from June’s EU elections, the EU recently reconfirmed its commitment to the Green Deal. Now, this could change. Professor of EU law Alberto Alemanno said, “The shift towards a less climate and environmentally friendly policy agenda in the US will inevitably further tarnish the EU commitment towards those goals.”
The EU’s landmark sustainability reporting rule, the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), which kicks in in 2025, is under the spotlight. A growing chorus of voices is asking for a weakening and rollback of the CSRD. France’s President Michel Barnier claims that there is an “over-transposition” issue for EU rules, making EU farmers and businesses less competitive. Adding that “This is particularly true for European texts such as the CSRD directive, the scope of which should be re-examined.”
Despite warnings of penalties, 17 member states still have not transposed the CSRD into national law. Critics of the CSRD see this lag in adoption as an opportunity to simplify the reporting regulation and reduce the burden on smaller companies by removing SMEs or non-EU companies from its scope. Another simplification proposal is to further delay the application of the full set of ESG standards, with climate reporting first and other sustainability metrics to follow.
In addition to the potential weakening of CSRD, the EU’s Deforestation Rule (EUDR), which was meant to kick in on December 30th this year until it was postponed for a year, was weakened in a vote on Thursday. EU lawmakers voted through 9 amendments, the main one being the exemption of ‘no risk’ of deforestation countries. Initially, 15 amendments were proposed, which would have substantially weakened the rule, postponing the EUDR for an additional two years. Former EU environment commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius said this will make the EU “look ridiculous in front of the partners and international community, backtracking on one of the biggest achievements of the previous Commission.” We will know by mid-December if these amendments are in the final rule.
While the EU’s President Ursula Von Der Leyden claims it is business as usual for the green deal, they are clearly under intense pressure to weaken aspects of it. However, most believe the EU’s green transition is too far along for much backtracking now, and for now, they have managed to resist calls for backtracking on rules like the ban on gas-powered cars by 2035.