The Arctic Council at its biannual meeting on Wednesday (15 May) in Sweden allowed in six new observer states, but deferred the EU's application until a later date. China, along with India, Italy, Japan, South Korea and ...

The Emissions Trading System (ETS) is the EU’s flagship climate policy and it is sinking fast. The stated aim is to put a price on carbon, providing a financial incentive for companies to cut their pollution and, ...

The European Parliament on Tuesday (16 April) voted against a proposal to revive one of its flagship climate policies, a move green groups called a "historic failure." The vote concerned a tweak to the Emissions Trading ...

“Commission moves forward on climate and energy towards 2030” reads the headline of the press release accompanying a recent ‘green paper’ on the same issue. Regrettably, the headline is more ambitious than the text of ...

Carbon emissions in the EU fell by 1.4 percent in 2012, raising hope the bloc will hit its targets on global warming gasses. The European Commission released the figures on Tuesday (2 April), with data from 89 percent ...

Greenlanders go to the polls on Tuesday (12 March) in a vote that will attract an inordinate amount of outside interest for a semi-autonomous territory of just 57,000 people. The interest is largely due to climate ...

Around 75 pro-green NGOs are jointly calling for the EU to scrap its carbon emission-trading scheme (ETS) ahead of a European Parliament vote to reform it. Set up in 2003, ETS is central to the EU’s carbon reduction ...

Climate activists say Europe failed to deliver at the UN’s Doha conference on climate change. “This time Europe – usually seen as a leader on climate change - comes away with dirty hands,” Kumi Naidoo, executive ...

The European Commission is proposing to suspend the enforcement of its controversial aviation tax for one year in a bid to allow dissenting non-EU countries to formulate an alternative global solution. "If this exercise ...

The EU intends to cap the contribution made by crop-based biofuels to its renewable energy target under draft legislation tabled on Wednesday (17 October) by the European Commission. The use of food-based biofuels will ...

The EU is pressing ahead with talks on further bi-lateral carbon emissions agreements with a deal with Australia just announced. Isaac Valero-Ladron, spokesperson for EU Climate Action Commissioner Connie Hedegaard, ...

The US congress is preparing to vote in a new law that would make it illegal for US carriers to pay into the EU's carbon aviation tax scheme. A senate committee gave the measure, already approved by the House of ...

The European Commission on Wednesday (25 July) announced short-term plans to bolster the carbon Emissions Trading Scheme, its flagship environment project undermined by rock bottom carbon prices. The scheme, which ...

Warsaw's latest battle against efforts to 'green' Europe's economy is being played out in the European Parliament's regional affairs committee. Polish-designed technical texts could kill the environment-friendly ...

The incoming Cypriot presidency is getting ready to tackle the biggest and ugliest dossier in the EU - the money - amid problems in its own backyard. "It's the big bang in the EU because everything gets put on the table ...

Five American Nobel-winning economists and 21 other US academics and businessmen have urged President Barack Obama to support the EU's hated CO2 tax on airlines. The group-of-26 in an open letter to Obama dated 14 March ...

EU member states have failed to name tar sands a high polluting energy source following intense lobbying by oil companies and Canada but green groups and the European Commission hope the politicisation of the discussion ...

Germany's solar power industry could cool as Berlin plans to cut subsidies in a sector whose energy capacity output has more than doubled the government’s projected target. German authorities want to slash up to 30 ...

EU measures to cut CO2 emissions and improve the climate have sparked outrage in the global aviation industry and most recently in Canada, home to the world’s second largest fossil fuel reserves. The Guardian newspaper ...

People like me love conspiracy theories. This is especially true with ones involving Russia. But since the end of last year, it seems that at least one of these theories is coming true. On 29 November 2011, the Gazprom ...

The invention of the steam pipe, spinning Jenny and other technologies dramatically increased production speeds and revolutionised European society in the 1800s. We need to stoke the boilers again, but this time we need ...

China has banned its airlines from taking part in Europe's Emissions Trading System (ETS), which forces all airlines flying in and out of Europe from 1 January this year to buy pollution permits. On Monday (6 February) ...

Waste incinerators instead of recycling, highways running through nature parks, airports in protected areas - 33 projects in central and eastern Europe funded with €16 billion out of the EU's regional policy coffers are ...

Four Chinese airlines are to legally challenge Europe's new carbon emission taxes, which are due to take effect from 1 January. The four carriers - Air China, China Eastern Airlines, China Southern Airlines and Hainan ...

The European Commission’s Energy Roadmap 2050 has been hotly anticipated for months. Within minutes of its finally being published today, press releases and news alerts were flying around. What a shame that some ...

Following agreement on a new global climate deal in the early hours of Sunday morning (11 December), the EU was quick to congratulate itself on brokering a "historic breakthrough", but environmental groups and ...

The stakes are high but expectations are low in Durban, South Africa, where talks began on Monday (28 November) on how to save the planet from the effects of rising temperatures. The meeting, the 17th of its kind since ...

The EU has said it will sign up to extending the international treaty on climate change but has little hope that the US and China will follow suit. In a speech laying out the EU's position ahead of international talks ...

The dynamic duo at the heart of European power, Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Nicolas Sarkozy, are to meet once again on Sunday in Berlin and thrash out their substantial differences over how to respond to the ...

An EU plan to cap airplane emissions from January is legal, the advocate general of the European Court of Justice said on Thursday (6 October) in response to a complaint from US airlines. The industry expressed its ' ...

This week, the European Parliament will devote a committee meeting to the issue of shale gas development. It places shale gas, practically unheard of as an energy source five years ago, squarely in the spotlight. No one ...

Certain Belgian employees receive up to €250 worth a year in eco-cheques. They are designed to promote ecological buying by enticing people to buy bio products. They are also a way for employers to survive the ...

The relationship between Europeans and their food is growing in complexity, governed by cultural, social and economic factors and influenced ever more by unpredictable weather patterns and the rising middle class in ...