EU Sets Goal To Cut Greenhouse Gas Emissions 40% By 2030

An anonymous reader writes: The 28 nations in the European Union agreed Friday to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 40% (going by 1990 levels) by the year 2030. The deal received widespread criticism; industry bosses said the 2030 targets were too extreme, while many environmental groups said the goals weren't ambitious enough. The deal requires each nation to achieve the goal independently — earlier targets could use international offsets to avoid or reduce action. EU officials hope the agreement will encourage the U.S. and China to take a more aggressive stance on fighting climate change.

Comments

Theory vs reality?

[argStyopa]

"EU officials hope the agreement will encourage the U.S. and China to take a more aggressive stance on fighting climate change."
The US?

Would that be the same United States that met the original Kyoto reduction targets without trying?

Re:Theory vs reality?

[JDAustin]

A few points of order though.
- Clinton signed Kyoto but never sent it to the senate. The reason being is it never had support from either party and would have died by about 90 votes.
- Second, W could have withdrawn from Kyoto with a stroke of a pen as the President can cancel treaties.
- And finally, treaties inherently do not have the force of law behind them. They do not supersede Federal, State or even individual rights (see the recent Bond v US ruling). Now the Obama admin doesn't agree with this as they argued that a treaty trumps everything....but as we know with Obama/Holder, just because he says its doesn't mean its true.

Re:Theory vs reality?

[inhuman_4]

Not the people, but business.

Doing things the green way is usually more expensive. Most companies would be happy to dump toxic shit in to rivers, and pollute the air if governments would let them. So if Europe says you have to do X to keep the environment clean, and X costs Y, some companies will pay Y amount and others will move so that they don't have to do X.

Nike could pay people a decent wage in the US to make their shoes. But sweat shops in the developing world are much cheaper. This is the same issue, but with the environment instead of wages.

Re:Theory vs reality?

[haruchai]

Europe's population has grown since 1990 but not as much.
No, it's not a given that emissions would have increased because there was little effort made to rein them in. The advanced Western nations enjoy a similar standard of living as North America but use far less energy to do so. And all those countries are democracies.

You may have missed the memo but China ate your lunch money anyway, to the tune of a couple TRILLION, mostly because you were sold on the idea of cheap shit and outsourced manufacturing - and US emissions increased, even per capita.
If it wasn't the for overall efficiency and large population of California & New York holding down the per-capita numbers, America would the worst of the Western nations for CO2 emissions by any measure.

And stop bitching about China & India having no restrictions - they were using only a fraction of the energy and resources despite their huge populations.
But if America had the balls to dive wholeheartedly into finding solutions, then they could sell them to the developing nations.

Re:Theory vs reality?

[Nemyst]

America's response to that is: can I make money off it next quarter? No? Not interested.

Re:...and everybody gets to be right

[ganjadude]

while many environmental groups said the goals weren't ambitious enough.

They could say they want to cut the number 100% by 2030, and there would be people out there saying its not fast enough. It seems for some reason everytime something like this comes up, the only people you hear are those who say we shouldnt do anything, and those who say we are already doomed and should live in mud huts. Why cant we come up with a rational response? something where we use what we have now, and work towards a better tomorrow together?

instead of saying "global warming is a hoax!" why not say "well, its always better to have a clean environment, so lets work towards the goals"

and instead of saying "we need to stop using oil now! we need to stop using X Y Z NOW!!!" , how about we say "well, i know we cant stop society by eliminating everything that is "bad for the environment" so lets work at it one step at a time"

in the end, we go broke, shady business people get rich, and nothing changes. its disgusting

Re:not a problem

[Teun]

Strange statement, if it were true then how come countries like Denmark and Germany that spend a lot of money and resources on renewable energy are doing better than many other EU countries?

PS, they don't shrink.

So, good news and bad news

[russotto]

The good news is the European nations just signed an economic suicide pact.

The bad news is there's no way they'll actually keep to it.