The EU is not serious in its fight against climate change. If it were, it wouldn’t merely shift emissions from one place to another but would instead focus its efforts to stop the emissions from growing globally. It would concentrate its efforts on the most challenging problem of the climate change, coal, and reducing its use especially in the developing countries.
(…) this means that all use of coal should be ceased immediately – or one should develop means to produce energy from coal completely emissions free. The EU climate policy does not support these goals.
The EU is practising the kind of climate policy, which is expensive and flashy, yet bureaucratic and lacking results. The main focus is in the reduction of the Union’s own local emissions, not the overall emissions to the atmosphere.
The Australian example is very illuminating. This island state increased the share of the renewable energy by 10 per cent from 2007 to 2008. At the same time, the usage of coal increased by a couple of per cent, which resulted in the overall emissions of Australia to grow.
The EU should, instead, abandon its renewable energy target and replace it with a clean energy target. At the moment, for instance, Europe practically cannot increase the share of an emissions free nuclear energy, as nuclear energy is not counted in as a renewable energy source.