BB & CC: Big Brother and Climate Change

(teksti on julkaistu myös PES@ctivists -blogissa)

“The United States is taking the lead, and that’s the message I’m going to take to the G-8,” Mr. Bush said according to the New York Times (NYT 1^st June 2007). – Is 'leadership' all that it is about? Until now – and certainly in the foreseeable future – the EU has been the obvious world leader in the fight against climate change.

No, it is not just about political power, I guess, but also about economic power. Bush has now understood that there is no way around but also the industry will have to take climate change seriously. He’d like to see that US companies would negotiate directly with Indian and Chinese governments and businesses and agree on standards and transfer of technologies.

For Bush, energy efficiency is suddenly ok, if it is achieved with technologies that the US can sell to other countries, instead of technologies developed in the EU, Japan, Korea, India or China.

What drives me nuts is that within the EU, there is still a huge number of politicians, business leaders and, I’m sorry to say, trade union leaders, who don’t see that the EU really has to get serious about energy savings, energy efficiency and renewable energy sources.

This morning in Helsinki, the EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs gave a presentation about EU energy policies. He listed three challenges: security, sustainability (well, he only discussed the climate change) and compatibility. He praised President Bush’s speech. Maybe this was ‘only’ diplomacy. The EU has every reason to denounce a plan to hold any “climate talks” next Fall parallel to the Bali negotiations about the next phase of the Kyoto Protocol.

How disappointing, such skilful political manoeuvring: to disguise business promotion as concern for the environment. Let us hope that the EU will be more skilful, more united and more swift in its moves than the Big Brother.