Environment Minister Andrzej Kraszewski at the informal EU Council meeting in Sopot, 11.07.2011. Photo: PAP/Adam Warżawa
EU environment ministers also met with experts and the European Commissioner for the Environment, Janez Potocnik, during today’s morning session.
After Monday morning’s meeting, environment minister Andrzej Kraszewski told journalists that the informal EU Council gathering is to plan a strategy for environmental protection for the next ten years, as well as draft a resume on what has been done over the past decade.
The environment talks will not take up the issue of CO2 emission quotas, however, even though Poland filed a complaint against the European Commission to the EU’s Court of Justice concerning the rights of free CO2 emissions on Friday.
Brussels wants free rights for CO2 emissions after 2012 to be defined by the levels of emissions with the use of the most modern technologies available within the EU.
Minister Kraszewski rebuffed journalists by stating that Poland is not avoiding the issue, however.
“We are telling everyone Poland’s stand on the matter,” he said. “Let us first count what the economic consequences will be, not for Europe as an average, but for each country. Then let us decide once we know the economic cost whether Europe can afford such higher environmental ambitions. I don’t think it can.”
The issue of Poland’s shale gas reserves will also be absent from the agenda in Sopot, although Kraszewski is to address the European Parliament on Wednesday on the matter.
Shale gas extraction has proven to be a controversial topic on the EU stage, with France banning shale gas extraction, known as ‘fracking’, due to its environmental impact.
“We cannot end up with a paranoid situation whereby coal is bad because it emits too much CO2,” Kraszewski said, adding that “after Fukushima no-one talks about nuclear energy anymore; gas is fine because [Poland] can buy it for four times the price from Russia, but that idea is both ridiculous and terrible at the same time; and shale gas is also rejected because its extraction harms the environment.”
“What now, are we supposed to use torches to read our books and newspapers in the evening?” the environment minister asked rhetorically.
The Sopot meeting is also billed to prepare the EU before the UN’s COP17 climate conference in Durban, South Africa, in December, when as leader of the EU Council, Poland is to announce the EU’s stance on the environment. (jb)