A majority of 328 members of the European Parliament in Strasbourg just voted today against the objection to the European Commission's delegated act on the Taxonomy Regulation, and thus in favour of classifying nuclear power and fossil gas as sustainable.
Henrike Hahn, Member of the European Parliament (The Greens/EFA), deputy speaker and industrial policy speaker of the German Delegation, substitute member of the ECON Committee, comments:
"A huge opportunity of introducing a credible taxonomy for greener financial markets in the European Union has been missed. It is unbelievable that a majority of the European Parliament decided to vote against a truly sustainable taxonomy as important facet of the Green Deal. With a credible EU taxonomy label, the EU could have demonstrated climate policy leadership. A sustainable label should only be put on truly sustainable products and investments. Greenwashing of financial markets has to be stopped and it must be made unmistakably clear that green financial products contain explicitly green investments. The EU must expand sustainable investments in the future and continue to invest in the energy transition and a climate-neutral economy. Only a path that leads away from fossil gas and nuclear power will give the financial industry real confidence in green investments. It's high time for an end to the European Union's dependence on fossil fuels and energy dependence on Russia."
Background:
The taxonomy is the EU Commission's green guide for investors. Recently, a cross-political group alliance of members of the Environment Committee (ENVI) and the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee (ECON) voted against labelling nuclear power and gas as sustainable. However, because of today's vote, investments in fossil gas projects and nuclear power plants shall also come under the EU Commission's taxonomy sustainability label in the future. The governments of Austria and Luxembourg have announced that they will challenge the decision of the Commission in court.
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