If it comes to the European Parliament, there is no longer just a climate change, not a climate crisis, but a climate emergency. At least that's what a majority of MEPs decided on Thursday. However, the resolution was not enough for the Greens. They criticized that Parliament had not committed to "concrete steps and immediate action".
The more remarkable was the course of another vote, which was indeed about concrete steps in the area of climate protection: the European Parliament resolution on the UN Climate Change Conference in Madrid, which starts next week. The far-reaching resolution was passed by a large majority, and Christian and Social Democrats and liberals voted almost in favor. By contrast, the majority were calculated: the Greens.
What the European Parliament demands from the Madrid Climate Change Conference is - unlike the climate change debate - not only of symbolic importance. Parliament must approve international agreements so that they can enter into force, and it also speaks with the laws for their implementation.
The resolution also has its central point: Parliament is now officially calling for EU greenhouse gas emissions to be cut by 55 percent by 2030 compared to 1990 levels. This is not just a massive increase in the previously valid reduction target of 40 percent. The Parliament thus takes over the position with which the Greens moved into the European elections in the summer.
Green faction split into the top of the faction
Nevertheless, 46 Greens voted against and only 15 voted in favor, two abstained. The crack even went right through the top of the group: The German Ska Keller was against the resolution, her Belgian co-faction leader Philippe Lamberts against.
According to group sources, the reason was not that the reduction target of 55 percent was too low - since last week, the Greens demand a minus of 65 percent. No, it was about something else: nuclear power.
In the course of the negotiations, a change found its way into the text of the resolution, which states that nuclear energy could "contribute to the achievement of climate protection goals". Finally, it does not emit greenhouse gases and could contribute "a significant part of EU electricity production". The resolution also calls for a "medium and long-term strategy" to tackle the issue of radiant waste. But that nuclear energy should be declared environmentally friendly, was apparently too much for most of the Greens.
The political competition took advantage of the steep template promptly. Daniel Caspary, head of the CDU / CSU group in the European Parliament, described the voting behavior of the Greens as "incomprehensible". Group leader Keller had supported the resolution together with the Christian Democrats. "All other German Greens call the climate emergency and then refuse the implementation," said Caspary. Thus the Greens are "completely unbelievable". Keller reproaches the Christian Democrats for their part that they "sit in the glass house" because they would have rejected concrete climate protection measures in the "emergency" -resolution.
New EU funds for new nuclear energy research?
For the Greens, however, the question of nuclear power threatens to become a permanent dilemma, the gap potential of which grows with the importance of the climate debate. On the one hand, there are those who are critical of nuclear power, but consider immediate climate protection more important than the immediate end of all nuclear power plants. On the other hand, there are those who either consider nuclear power to be devils themselves or are afraid of the parts of their electoral base that think so.
The nuclear issue has been driving the environmental movement for a long time. In 2007, for example, her pioneering thinker James Lovelock called for an end to "green romance" and a massive expansion of nuclear energy to protect the climate. Similarly, prominent climate scientists comment. The US climatologist James Hansen described in the interview with Der Spiegel the nuclear phase-out as a "big mistake for the world" and accused environmental organizations to hold on for some irrational reasons to their anti-nuclear attitude.
In addition, there is a lot of money in the debate. If nuclear power is considered climate-friendly, it could give operators access to billions from the United Nations climate funds. Something similar is happening at EU level. According to the SPIEGEL, the research ministers of the EU member states want to discuss a decision in Brussels on Wednesday, in which nuclear research is described as "a possible contribution to the transition to a climate-neutral energy system" - and not just EU funding millions, but from 2022 might also get energy loans from the European Investment Bank.
