Former Prime Minister and Head of the Labour Party Delegation at the Socialist and Democratic Group (S&D) Alfred Sant voted against the revocation of the European Commission’s Taxonomy Complementary Climate Delegated Act on climate change mitigation and adaptation which covers certain gas and nuclear activities. In order to attain the green deal targets justified anxieties about security of energy supplies and rising global inflation must first be allayed, Sant emphasized. For this to happen it is imperative that access to sources of nuclear and natural gas energy are flexibly put in place.
The Taxonomy Regulation is part of the European Commission’s action plan. It aims to prevent greenwashing and to encourage investors to identify economic activities in line with our environmental and climate objectives. The Complementary Climate Delegated Act promulgated by the European Commission includes additional economic activities from the energy sector that are to be in the European Taxonomy: natural gas and nuclear energy sectors. This has prompted huge protests from green activists who lobbied hard for the European Parliament to vote down the Complementary Delegated Act.
Sant acknowledged that nuclear and natural gas are not environmentally neutral. However, he stressed that they offer reasonable transitional paths to environmentally neutral energy. Moreover, gas and nuclear activities can prove crucial in keeping economies going as public authorities try to reach their anti-global warming goals. The Labour MEP stated that the inclusion in the “green” taxonomy of nuclear and gas covers this scenario in the clearest and most transparent manner.
“To be coherent with what I have been advocating for small and peripheral economies, where I argue in favour of special transitional approaches to preserve the competitiveness of such economies, I cannot now in logic vote against an equivalent approach for nuclear and gas bound economies”, Sant argued.
278 MEPs voted in favour of the resolution, 328 against and 33 abstained. An absolute majority of 353 MEPs was needed for the European Parliament to veto the European Commission’s proposal. If neither the European Parliament, nor the European Council object to the proposal by 11 July 2022, the Taxonomy Delegated Act will come into effect as of 1 January 2023.