{"id":623895,"date":"2025-12-10T09:09:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T09:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/623895\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T09:09:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T09:09:17","slug":"eu-commits-to-legally-binding-90-reduction-in-ghg-emissions-by-2040","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/623895\/","title":{"rendered":"EU commits to \u2018legally-binding\u2019 90% reduction in GHG emissions by 2040"},"content":{"rendered":"

The European Union has committed to a \u2018legally-binding\u2019 climate target of a 90% reduction in net greenhouse gas emissions<\/a> by 2040, following a provisional political agreement between the European Parliament and EU Member States.<\/p>\n

The agreed climate target, which the EU says will secure \u2018a clear and steady trajectory towards a decarbonised European<\/a> economy by 2050\u2032, underlines the bloc\u2019s commitment to the Paris Agreement<\/a>, according to European Commission<\/a> president Ursula von der Leyen.<\/p>\n

\u2018Strong commitment\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, the EU is showing our strong commitment to climate action and the Paris Agreement. One month after COP30, we have turned our words into action \u2013 with a legally binding target of 90% emissions reduction by 2040,\u201d she commented. \u201cWe have a clear direction of travel towards climate neutrality. And a pragmatic and flexible plan to make the clean transition more competitive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Commission added that the agreement incudes the option to use international credits to make an \u2018adequate contribution\u2019 towards the 2040 target, starting in 2036, which may account for up to 5% of 1990 emissions levels.<\/p>\n

Describing the agreement as a \u2018pragmatic and flexible\u2019 way of achieving targeted emissions reductions by 2040, it highlighted the role of domestic permanent removals within the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) to compensate for residual hard-to-abate emissions, and cited \u2018greater flexibilities within and across sectors and instruments\u2019 to help member states address shortfalls in specific areas simple and cost-effective way, without altering overall progress.<\/p>\n

The agreement also postpones the application of the EU Emissions trading system for buildings, road transport as well as small industries (ETS2) by one year, from 2027 to 2028, however, the Commission noted that this postponement does not affect the monitoring, reporting and verification requirements under ETS2, which commenced this year.<\/p>\n

\u2018Speed, predictability, and flexibility\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cThis agreement is pragmatic and ambitious, delivering speed, predictability, and flexibility,\u201d added Wopke Hoekstra, commissioner for Climate, Net Zero and Clean Growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cAbove all, it shows that climate<\/a>, competitiveness and independence go hand in hand and sends a powerful message to our global partners. Our industry, citizens, and Member States now have a clear direction to guide their investments to achieve a climate neutral EU by 2050.\u201d<\/p>\n

In terms of the next steps, the agreement, an amendment to the European Climate Law, will go on to be formally adopted by the European Parliament and the Council of the EU, before being entered in to the Official Journal of the EU and entering into force. Read more here<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Like this:<\/p>\n

Like Loading…<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The European Union has committed to a \u2018legally-binding\u2019 climate target of a 90% reduction in net greenhouse gas…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":623896,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[5398,2000,299,5187,1699,12],"class_list":{"0":"post-623895","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-emissions","9":"tag-eu","10":"tag-europe","11":"tag-european","12":"tag-european-union","13":"tag-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115694493045871980","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=623895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623895\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/623896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=623895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=623895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=623895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}