EU Takes On Climate Change

The EU has generated an entire new package to cut carbon emissions.  “We have agreed what is now the most comprehensive package in terms of climate action and renewable energy anywhere in the world,” said President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso.
“We believe it is good for our planet, good for the European economy, good for our citizens.”
The proposals add up to nothing short of a revolution in Europe’s industrial and energy landscape.  It brings into action the political vision agreed last March, when European leaders agreed that the EU should lead the crusade against climate change.

The binding targets will include:
•    Increasing the use of renewable energies like biomass, wind and solar power to 20 percent of all energy forms by 2020 across the EU
•    Biofuels to make up ten percent of fuels used for transport by 2020
•    From 2013, energy-intensive industries such as power plants will have to buy or sell permits - currently handed out by governments for free - to emit carbon dioxide
The European Commission stated that costs will include the following:
•    Overall cost estimated at about 0.5 percent of GDP or Euro 3 per week per citizen
•    One million new jobs created in renewables sector by 2020
•    Electricity prices to increase by 10-15 percent by 2020
•    Reduction of energy imports worth 50 billion euros a year