It is a decisive decade for planet Earth, but we are not too late to tackle climate change, the President of the European Commission Ursula Von der Leyen said. In an interview on the European Green Deal, Von der Leyen speaks of a green transition that has to be fair and socially just and a heavy EU investment in the charging infrastructure to encourage more consumers to buy zero-emission cars.

She told The Malta Independent on Sunday that Malta will be receiving almost €1.3 billion from the EU budget, in particular from our recovery plan NextGenerationEU. This will allow for significant investments in the development renewables and the greening of the country’s economy. In Malta, the share of energy coming from solar power is already more than twice as high as in the rest of the EU. The European Green Deal will further support Malta’s efforts to make use of its large renewable energy potential, Von der Leyen said.

Some people argue that politicians at all levels waited too long to do something about climate change. Would you agree with this statement and do you believe the Green Deal should have come sooner?

It is not too late. But we have to act now. This is a decisive decade for our planet. This is why the road to climate neutrality has been my number one priority since I started my mandate as President of the European Commission. As a matter of fact, I introduced the European Green Deal just 11 days after I took office in December 2019. Europe has made extraordinary progress since then.

All 27 EU Member States and the European Parliament have democratically agreed on ambitious climate targets. They became legally binding, in our first-of-a-kind European Climate Law. And with the European Green Deal package that we presented in July, Europe is the first continent with a clear, comprehensive roadmap to reach its climate targets. We are fully determined to make climate neutrality a reality for Europeans.

One of the proposals is for all new cars registered as of 2035 to be zero-emission, which would make it impossible to sell new fossil fuel-powered vehicles. Malta was already moving towards zero emission vehicles, but my question is this: couldn’t this move result in households that do not have a good income suffering, given that electric vehicles are generally more expensive, and what can be done to help solve this problem?

Let’s not forget why we do have to act now. Extreme weather events are happening all over the globe, more and more often. Poorer citizens, who cannot afford to just move or rebuild, are always hit the hardest. To drive down emissions, we need to put a price on carbon. We know that carbon pricing works. Our existing Emissions Trading System has already helped to significantly reduce emissions in heavy industry and power generation. Now we propose a second ETS for sectors where so far emission reductions have been lacking: buildings and road transport. Transport is the only sector where emissions have continued to grow since 1990. We cannot afford this anymore.

And the green transition has to be fair and socially just. That’s why we propose to provide compensation and support to more vulnerable citizens. Our €72 billion Social Climate Fund will support people on low incomes and will facilitate investments in clean technologies. It will start one year before this second ETS for buildings and transport, to make sure that social compensation for small incomes is already in place.

The goal is precisely to cut bills for vulnerable households and small businesses.  The fund will support citizens in Malta to finance zero-emission heating or cooling systems – install solar panels on their houses, for example, or to buy a cleaner car. Transport and energy must be affordable for all.

In parallel, industry is moving forward. We have around a dozen major car producers who already announced that they will produce zero-emission vehicles only by 2035 or even earlier. The more clean models come on the market, the more prices will fall.

And the EU will invest in the charging infrastructure. Europe’s recovery plan, NextGenerationEU, foresees massive investments in private and public charging points, but also in new filling stations for clean fuels. This investment is in all Member States’ national recovery plans. This will make it easier for citizens to switch to clean mobility.

A major power station in Malta uses LNG. What kind of effects could the Green Deal have on the operation and use of such a plant?

Gas is not a long-term solution to get us to climate neutrality by 2050, but for certain Member States or sectors it can be a steppingstone, a transitional solution to diversify supply. Later this year, we will present proposals for the decarbonization of the gas market. These proposals will set out in more detail our plans for this sector.

The Commission proposes to increase the binding target of renewable sources in the EU’s energy mix to 40%. Now the EU is making a push for the use of hydrogen for instance, but what kind of importance can be given to solar power?

We expect solar to play an important role in the energy system of the future. In the scenarios we presented for 2030, solar would provide around 14% of all electricity consumed in the EU, up by 10 percentage points compared to the current situation.

And as a matter of fact, the production of green hydrogen relies on renewable energies, such as solar power, wind energy or bioenergy.

In Malta, which is blessed with sunshine throughout the year, the share of energy coming from solar power is already more than twice as high as in the rest of the EU. The European Green Deal will further support Malta’s efforts to make use of its large renewable energy potential.

In addition, Malta will receive almost EUR 1.3 billion from the EU budget, in particular from our recovery plan NextGenerationEU. This will allow for significant investments in the development of renewables and the greening of the country’s economy.

One of the Green Deal’s priorities is to move towards a circular economy. Has or will the EU Commission be setting any targets for member states in this regard?

The circular economy is the path towards a more sustainable use of resources. Towards more sustainable production, more sustainable consumption, and better waste management. It is a key aspect of the European Green Deal. Last year, we presented a Circular Economy Action Plan, with three main objectives: strengthen the competitiveness of our European industry, empower consumers and protect the environment.

The Plan focuses not on countries but on the sectors that use the most resources, and where circularity will have maximum effect – for instance, electronics, plastics, textiles, packaging, batteries and vehicles, to name just a few.

We want to transform these sectors into circular systems where waste is reduced to the minimum. If waste cannot be avoided, then it has to be turned into a valuable resource. This will create many business opportunities while protecting our environment.

To step up our efforts, we also plan to review existing EU rules on waste, like on waste shipments, packaging and end-of-life vehicles. And we will explore more measures on waste prevention, in order to halve the amount of non-recycled municipal waste by 2030, for example.

What kind of impact will the Green Deal proposals have on the construction and renovation of buildings? Could this have an impact on property or construction prices?

All sectors of the economy have to contribute to our EU-wide efforts for climate action. This is the case for the construction sector. The European Green Deal indeed foresees an unprecedented ‘Renovation Wave’ to boost energy renovation of buildings in the EU. We need this. Today, buildings are responsible for 40 percent of the EU’s energy consumption. 75 percent of buildings in the EU are not energy efficient. We aim to double – at least – the annual energy renovation rate of buildings by 2030. And while it helps protect our climate, it also means better insulation. So lower energy bills for residents.

The construction industry is already moving forward. They have understood that staying competitive means investing in clean technologies and products. In doing so they create sustainable, local and well-paid jobs across Europe.

And there will be unprecedented public investment to support renovation. Roughly a third of our recovery plan NextGenerationEU and of the EU budget will support green and sustainable projects all over Europe. That means more than €500 billion from the EU level. This will finance, among other things, large-scale energy efficiency renovation in Europe – and in Malta.

Add to this national budgets and private investment, there is more money out there than ever before to finance the green transition.

Realistically speaking, do you believe the member states have the will and ability to achieve the goals and targets set out by the Green Deal, including that by 2050 Europe would be the world’s first climate-neutral continent?

All 27 Member States have agreed on our ambitious climate targets. Our European Green Deal therefore is based on powerful democratic legitimation.  But you’re right. Having ambitious goals is one thing. Becoming concrete and describing the path to the goal in a credible way is a more difficult task. This is what we have done with the package of proposals that we presented in July.  During the negotiations there will be discussions with the Member States and with the European Parliament on many elements of the package. I invite them to contribute with ideas on how we can achieve the common goal in a better way.

But let us be very clear: our level of ambition is already binding law. And all Europeans want a healthy life, good jobs and growth that does not hurt our nature. I am confident Member States will act to protect our climate, with their citizens’ best interest at heart.

Lastly, if Europe does reach its goals, what kind of impact will this have globally?

Firstly, I believe that the rest of the world is also waking up to the facts: the cost of not acting against global warming is rising dramatically everywhere. We have recently seen heavy rain and flooding in China, but also deadly temperatures in Canada and melting permafrost in Siberia, to name a few examples. So, the fight against climate change is a truly global effort.

With the European Green Deal, Europe is leading the way. If others follow our lead, the world will be able to keep warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius. We are encouraging all other countries that have ambitious climate goals to also come with a clear roadmap on how to achieve them. That is the spirit in which we will approach the UN’s COP-26 climate conference in Glasgow this autumn.

The EU is a global leader in climate action, but we know that a global effort is needed to tackle climate change and build more resilient, sustainable economies, and that is why we are working to mobilize the global effort.

Because to save the climate, we need the world. We need all major economies to take their responsibility and to turn the transition into an opportunity for all. Climate neutrality should be a global benchmark. That is what our planet needs.