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ThyssenKrupp in Schwelgern am Rhein (symbol image): According to the report, there is progress in the fight against air pollution
Photo: Olaf Döring / IMAGO
The European Union wants to create a largely pollution-free environment by 2050.
According to a new report, however, improvements must be made in order to achieve the ambitious goal that has already been set.
In the areas of traffic noise and waste, the EU is already in danger of missing the targets it has set for itself by 2030.
Further efforts are therefore necessary, according to the report by the EU Environment Agency EEA.
On the other hand, there is progress in the fight against air pollution and in improving soil quality.
The report is a kind of inventory, the EU is still at a very early stage in achieving the goals.
The basis of the efforts is the “Zero Pollutants” action plan.
The EU Commission presented this in 2021 as part of the so-called European Green Deal.
In it, she set six milestones for 2030. The overarching goal of the plan: Pollution in the EU is to be reduced to the point where it no longer poses a risk to human health and the environment by 2050.
advances in air quality
Today we are still dealing with pollution levels that pose a serious threat, said the Executive Director of the Copenhagen-based EU Environment Agency, Hans Bruyninckx.
"We will not be able to reduce pollution to zero without changing the systems that underlie it."
Airborne pollutants remain the number one environmental health concern in the EU.
According to the Environment Agency, they are one of the main reasons for premature death and illness.
The action plan stipulates that the number of these premature deaths should fall by more than 55 percent by 2030 compared to 2005.
The experts at the Copenhagen-based EEA are confident that this will succeed.
In 2020, around 240,000 people in the EU died prematurely as a result of exposure to particulate matter in the air around them - 45 percent fewer than in 2005. If this trend continues, the Commission's target will probably be achieved, according to the report.
This also applies to the goal that by 2030 there should be a quarter fewer ecosystems in the EU in which biodiversity is threatened by air pollution.
The EU is also on the right track when it comes to improving soil quality by 2030: Among other things, the plan provides for a 50 percent reduction in the use of chemical pesticides and the sale of certain antibiotics, for example for livestock.
The goals are tenable - even if so far only the lower use, not the effects on the environment can be measured.
Backlog demand for fertilization
Only in the case of plant nutrients such as nitrogen compounds and phosphate is there no improvement in sight.
The problem arises, for example, from excessive fertilization in agriculture and also affects some German regions.
Such nutrients put a strain on ecosystems and groundwater.
These values should therefore be reduced by 50 percent by 2030.
"But we think it's highly doubtful that this goal will be achieved," said Bruyninckx.
There is also a need to catch up on the three other goals: neither the number of people constantly suffering from traffic noise nor the amount of waste has seen a positive trend in recent years.
Actually, these numbers should drop by 30 percent by 2030.
Accordingly, the requirements cannot be met.
It is also unclear whether the targets for plastic pollution - that 50 percent less plastic waste ends up in the oceans and 30 percent less microplastics in the environment - can be met by 2030.
The database of the EEA was still too sparse for an analysis.
ani/dpa
