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15161. Getting to 30-60: How China’s Biggest Coal Power, Cement, and Steel Corporations Are Responding to National Decarbonization Pledges

Author:
Edmund Downie
Publication Date:
08-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP), Columbia University
Abstract:
In September 2020, China announced its intentions to peak carbon emissions by 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2060. The neutrality goal in particular was a breakthrough for global climate ambitions: a net-zero target from the world’s largest emitter, responsible for around one-quarter of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The two new goals—referred to in Chinese policy discourse as the “30-60” goals—are not China’s first public targets on GHG reduction. They are, however, the centerpieces of a new Chinese climate policy in which GHG cuts are a standalone goal rather than an ancillary benefit of more immediate priorities like energy efficiency and industrial upgrading. Prior approaches had required little engagement from firms in carbon management. Indeed, none of the largest Chinese firms in the coal power, cement, and steel sectors had publicized quantitative targets for reducing or controlling carbon emissions before the government announced the 30-60 goals. They faced little pressure to do so; authorities pressed firms in climate-adjacent areas like reducing air pollution rather than carbon management. The 30-60 announcement appears to mark a break from this era, forcing firms to adjust accordingly. This report, part of the China Energy and Climate Program at Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy, assesses how China’s high-emitting industries have responded to the 30-60 targets and the accompanying elevation of climate within national policy priorities. It focuses on corporate and sectoral emissions reduction targets through June 2021 among 30 major firms in three of China’s largest sources of direct emissions: coal power generation, cement, and steel.
Topic:
Energy Policy, Natural Resources, Infrastructure, Coal, Industry, and Decarbonization
Political Geography:
China and Asia

15162. Europe and the challenge set by history

Author:
Alain Lamassoure
Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
Irrespective of the beatification of Robert Schuman by the Church, many consider the greatest achievement of European construction to be a miracle. Contrary to what is often said, the first success of this process is not peace: it would be childish to claim that, without the Treaty of Rome, a third world war would have started on the Old Continent. Instead, the real success, which can be described as a miracle because it has no historical precedent anywhere else in the world, is the reconciliation between neighbouring peoples who had considered themselves hereditary enemies for centuries. European peace, a profoundly original pax europeana, is not simply the absence of war. It is indeed peace of mind. Our fathers hated each other's guts, our children are now getting married. Not only can no one imagine an armed conflict between our countries, but a kind of informal pacifism has become so natural to the present generations that the mere association of 'Europe' and 'peace' makes them yawn with boredom. To the point, moreover, of complicating the establishment of a European defence system, which we need ... because the rest of the world is not at all resistant to war. But nothing lasts forever in this world, especially not miracles. It is our duty to consolidate and root it. Firstly, this requires handing down the narrative and the lessons to the younger generation. Therefore, by teaching history in school.
Topic:
History, Regional Integration, and Peace
Political Geography:
Europe

15163. EU sets new course for the Arctic

Author:
Laurent Mayet
Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
The European Union's strengthened engagement in the Arctic, presented on 13 October, marks two new directions in the Union's diplomatic positioning: a strategic and security turn, and the absolute priority given to the fight against climate change.
Topic:
Security, Climate Change, Diplomacy, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe and Arctic

15164. The rule of law in Poland or the false argument about the primacy of European law

Author:
Eric Maurice, Emilie Malivert, and Ana Pasturel
Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
On 24 November, the Polish Constitutional Tribunal ruled that the European Convention on Human Rights was partially incompatible with the country's constitution. In July and October, it had issued similar rulings on the Treaty on European Union (TEU). This double decision comes as the European Commission suspended the approval of Poland's €36 billion recovery plan, including €23.9 billion in EU grants, due to concerns about the rule of law. On 19 November, the Commission also sent a letter to the Polish government as a prelude to the launch of a procedure that could lead to the suspension of EU funds under the budgetary conditionality regulation. The confrontation between the Polish government and the European institutions, primarily the Commission and the European Court of Justice, has been presented by the Polish government as a struggle of principle between the primacy of European law, which was allegedly being imposed excessively on Member States, with "the national legal order and the supreme force of the Constitution” being under threat. The Polish Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, explained that the implementation of EU law, as requested by the CJEU, would lead to "a fundamental lowering of the constitutional standards of judicial protection of Polish citizens, and unimaginable legal chaos". Beyond the grandstanding and responses in support of an effort to defend the sovereignty of peoples, it appears that the weakening of these constitutional norms in recent years in Poland is precisely what has led the Constitutional Tribunal to partly denounce the TEU (European Union) and the European Convention on Human Rights (Council of Europe), and that the quarrel over the primacy of European law is essentially a smokescreen to hide this situation.
Topic:
Human Rights, Sovereignty, Constitution, Rule of Law, Institutions, and Norms
Political Geography:
Europe and Poland

15165. Europe-India: new strategic challenges

Author:
Karine Lisbonne de Vergeron
Publication Date:
12-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
The most recent India-EU summits, held on 15 July 2020 and 8 May 2021, significantly enhanced the strategic dimension of the bilateral relationship. India was one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with the European Union when representatives of the then EEC met with several Indian diplomats based in Europe in 1961. But it was not until much later that the first high-level summit between India and the EU took place in Lisbon in June 2000, marking the real beginning of meaningful bilateral relations. It was followed in 2005 by the launch of a “strategic partnership” between the two parties. The push to deepen bilateral cooperation in recent years is all the more important and necessary given that economic and political relations between Europe and India have long been better defined with individual Member States, rather than with the European Union as a whole. This has been reinforced by a certain inertia in the intensity of the bilateral link over the years, as EU-India bilateral summits, although annual in principle, were blocked between 2012 and 2016 and the negotiations launched in 2007 for a Free Trade Agreement are still ongoing. The strategic strengthening of Indo-EU dialogue over the past three years therefore marks an important turning point and underlines a clear commitment to move forward on major issues of common interest to move beyond piecemeal politics and give the bilateral relationship a more strategic, long-term focus.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Bilateral Relations, European Union, and Partnerships
Political Geography:
Europe and India

15166. The Covid-19 pandemic, what lessons for the European Union?

Author:
Sylvain Kahn
Publication Date:
12-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
The European Council of 16th December 2021 once again focused on the public health situation and, more generally, on "work to strengthen our collective preparedness, response capacity and resilience to future crises". This includes learning as much as possible from the lessons of the pandemic as the Omicron variant spreads rapidly around the world.
Topic:
European Union, Crisis Management, Public Health, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
Europe

15167. The European Central Bank’s Monetary Policy Strategy Review: the key to a return to sustainable growth in Europe

Author:
Nicolas Goetzmann
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
On 23 January 2020, a few weeks before the Covid19 pandemic began, Christine Lagarde, President of the European Central Bank (ECB), announced that a "strategy review" would be held with the aim of evaluating the monetary policy conducted since May 2003, the date of the last "review". Faced with an inflation rate significantly below 2%, whereas its objective is "below but close to 2% over the medium term", the ECB had no choice but to carry out such a procedure.
Topic:
Monetary Policy, Economic Growth, European Central Bank, and Sustainability
Political Geography:
Europe

15168. Sanctions, a privileged instrument of European Foreign Policy

Author:
Ramona Bloj
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
The value of sanctions does not only lie in their effectiveness. Sanctions are often a means of sending a clear signal of disapproval, a foreign policy stance, more moderate than an embargo, less dangerous than military retaliation. It is thus halfway between inaction and violent overreaction. In this respect, it is not surprising that the European Union has made it a privileged instrument of its foreign policy
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Sanctions, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe

15169. The Franco-Italian relationship on the eve of the Quirinal Treaty: between asymmetry and proximity

Author:
Gilles Gressani
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
Leonardo da Vinci, Mazarin, Dalida ... Since the Renaissance, and with astonishing continuity, the Franco-Italian connection has become a given in European history. The two States are shaped by similar political models and have comparable economic structures. They have experienced similar social crises, trajectories and a homogeneous sense of decline[1]. France, Italy's leading investor and third largest country for the establishment of Italian subsidiaries, is Italy's second largest trading partner and Italy is France's second largest trading partner: in 2019, before the Covid crisis, the volume of trade between the two countries was close to €90 billion. The interconnection and proximity between a significant share of the two populations is expressed by language, a certain lifestyle, the relationship to heritage, a common culture: Latin, Mediterranean, European. Reflecting on the relations between these two areas since the 17th century, three historians have recently taken up this old idea: France and Italy are "two sister nations" whose history is increasingly "intertwined[2]". This proximity, which seems so obvious, brings a paradox to the fore. Can we really say that within the framework of European integration there is a FrancoItalian dimension, in the same way as there is one that is Franco-German?
Topic:
Bilateral Relations, Regional Integration, Trade, and Asymmetric Relations
Political Geography:
Europe, France, and Italy

15170. Governance of the European Union: changing approaches without changing the treaties: A free proposal for reflection on the future of the Union

Author:
Jean-Dominique Giuliani
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
The European Union has become part of the political landscape. Within the nations of the continent, integration is no longer criticised in principle, but it is so now in its conditions. The Union has established itself on paper. It must prove itself in reality. Yet its effectiveness in action is regularly challenged[1]. Thus, with regard to the fight against the Covid19 pandemic, the Commission has seen the main criticisms of slowness, bureaucracy and even lack of transparency focused on the European institutions, arguments which were already being levelled at it with regard to other policies such as competition or trade. This is the paradox of a European construction that is about to celebrate its 70th anniversary. It was on 18 April 1951 that the first European treaty was signed, the one establishing the European Coal and Steel Community. As it has become more and more accepted, it has been increasingly questioned. Its methods of action must adapt to a new era.
Topic:
Treaties and Agreements, Governance, and European Union
Political Geography:
Europe