Political backing for EU Green Deal fizzles despite heat wave

Dangerous heat fueled by climate change is putting tens of thousands of lives at risk, but a growing number of European politicians want to take a break from Green Deal lawmaking.

For the past few years, the European Union has passed ambitious green legislation by building on the grand coalition that elected Ursula von der Leyen.

But with fresh elections looming next year, von der Leyen’s Green Deal, which aims to make the bloc climate neutral by mid-century, is facing pushback from her own political group, the center-right European People’s Party (EPP) — threatening to slow the bloc’s efforts to cut planet-warming emissions just as extreme heat sweeps across Southern Europe.

“We’re dealing with some really extreme weather in Europe and this is the moment to take some difficult decisions,” said Mohammed Chahim, vice chair of the center-left Socialists & Democrats (S&D) in the European Parliament. “But in the end, we need democratic majorities for that.”

Those majorities are becoming slimmer — both in Parliament and among EU governments in the Council, with appetite for more environmental regulation waning in many capitals.

The informal European Parliament coalition between EPP, S&D and the centrist Renew Europe groups — which not only secured von der Leyen’s election as Commission president but also delivered reliable majorities for Green Deal laws for years — has crumbled in recent months as the center right changed tack on climate.

While the EPP insists it still backs the Green Deal, the group has called for a “moratorium” on climate rule-making and launched an aggressive campaign against several environmental laws.

“We definitely see a shift in the narrative, especially on the part of the moderate conservatives, represented by the EPP in the European Parliament,” said Luca Bergamaschi, co-founder of Italian climate think tank ECCO.

It’s not just Parliament. Several EU leaders, including centrists like France’s Emmanuel Macron, have taken up the EPP’s call for a regulatory “pause.”

Polling suggests both Council and Parliament are likely to shift further to the right following national and European elections over the next year.

And then there’s a chance that the politician who embodies the Green Deal will leave Brussels soon: Commission climate chief Frans Timmermans may return to Dutch politics for November’s general election.

Green Deal under attack

More than 60,000 Europeans died of heat-related causes last summer, and this year is shaping up to be even hotter. Yet at no other point in von der Leyen’s tenure has the EU’s climate coalition looked this fragile.

Most parties and politicians back Europe’s 2050 climate neutrality target. But measures to achieve this milestone have increasingly come under attack.

Energy-security concerns boosted the case for renewables last year, but rising costs are prompting some to call for a slower pace on climate legislation — or emulate the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act with its lavish subsidies rather than adding more new rules.

The EU’s growing number of green regulations “is a huge problem,” said German MEP Peter Liese, environmental spokesman for the EPP. “It’s important not to demand too much.”

Those calls intensified in spring, when a farmers’ party won the Dutch provincial election amid protests against new emissions rules.

Spooked, the EPP — which sees itself as the main defender of rural interests — launched a campaign against elements of the Green Deal targeting agriculture. That made a target of the EU’s flagship Nature Restoration Law, a proposal key to boosting the Continent’s natural carbon sinks.

While the EPP narrowly failed to kill the law last week, it succeeded in weakening it — for example, completely scrapping restoration targets for wetlands. The group also recently managed to water down other bills, like new rules for livestock farm emissions.

“Sure, the headline is the EPP failed, but if you look at the amendments that passed, then Timmermans and the [Socialist] lead MEP failed,” said Liese. “There is not much left of what they wanted.”

The Commission, it seems, was chastened by the fierce backlash to its nature law; it came forward with only nonbinding targets for a soil law that had also attracted the EPP’s ire.

Shifting majorities

Many MEPs see the battle over the Nature Restoration Law as a rupture. The tone was far rougher than it had been in any other Green Deal legislative debate, with the EPP walking out of negotiations and facing accusations that it was spreading misleading claims.

Liese said “frustration had been building” in the EPP over the feeling its views were ignored by other groupings, and the harsher rhetoric was a “necessary strategy to change the spirit in the environment committee.”

“Without the EPP, there will be no majority, particularly in the next Parliament,” he added.

While there’s almost a year to go until the European election, current polling suggests the next Parliament could be more conservative, particularly with the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists gaining ground.

That means forming majorities for ambitious climate action could be even more difficult by next summer.

Meanwhile, domestic politics have increasingly held up green legislation in the Council this year, from Germany nearly blocking the phaseout of combustion-engine cars to France delaying renewables legislation to extract concessions for nuclear power.

The Council, too, is likely to shift further right over the coming months.

Spain’s election this Sunday could replace a Socialist government — which has generally backed strong green legislation — with a conservative coalition including a far-right party that does not even mention climate change in its program. The Netherlands and Slovakia may follow in the fall.

With some governments like Poland already skeptical of the Green Deal, “if you put all that together, you have a potential blocking minority,” warned Pascal Canfin, a Renew MEP and chair of the Parliament’s environment committee.

Ambition warning

Climate-focused policymakers are trying to stay optimistic.

Canfin expressed hope that the EPP’s Nature Restoration Law campaign would not be “the new normal” and that, at least until next year’s European election, groups would be able to find majorities in favor of strong Green Deal laws.

A Commission official, granted anonymity because they are not authorized to speak with the press, believes that increasingly severe weather events would ensure climate stays high on the agenda no matter who gets elected.

“The thing with climate change is that we’re constantly confronted with the consequences,” the official said. “Whatever the politics may be, reality has a way of ensuring the decisions get taken.”

But Bergamaschi warned that with a rightward shift, the EU would likely pass and implement weaker measures in the mid-to-late 2020s — the time period scientists say is the most critical for limiting global warming.

“What we expect is less ambition because of the swing toward the center-right,” he said. “This then will be a huge problem for Europe — for its credibility and for climate action in general.”