Documents European Environment Agency, Copenhagen 51 results

"The EU has significantly strengthened its climate policies (primarily through the Fit for 55 package) to reach its 2030 target and to respond to new challenges posed by a rapidly changing international environment. Achieving climate neutrality by 2050 will require further development of climate policies. In the context of this strengthened EU climate policy framework, this report aims to provide the EU with scientific advice on policy actions that can support the achievement of climate neutrality by 2050 at the latest. With this report, the European Scientific Advisory Board on Climate Change (hereafter Advisory Board) aims to advise EU policy-makers on how to make the EU's policies and measures 'fit for net zero', by flagging up areas for improvement and gaps in the current framework. To that end, it assesses the progress made towards the EU's climate objectives, as well as the consistency of EU policies with the climate neutrality objective. Where sufficient scientific evidence is available, it also puts forward recommendations to address these gaps. By doing so, the Advisory Board aims to provide an independent input to the stocktake process established at EU level under the European Climate Law, in complement to existing assessments by the European Environment Agency (EEA, the annual Trends and Projections reports (EEA, 2023p)) and the European Commission (the Climate Action Progress Report (EC, 2023ax)). This report is an integral part of the Advisory Board's effort to provide scientific advice on existing and proposed EU measures and their consistency with the EU's climate objectives, and to identify actions and opportunities to successfully achieve these targets, in line with the mandate set out in the European Climate Law (EU, 2021c). The report provides a first general assessment of progress and policy consistency in different sectors (energy supply, industry, transport, buildings, agriculture and LULUCF) and for cross-cutting issues (pricing of emissions and rewarding removals, just transition and public engagement, finance and investments, innovation, governance, and skills and capacity building). All recommendations include explanations of the evidence and rationale supporting them."

"The chemicals strategy for sustainability towards a toxic-free environment (CSS) embraces two overarching goals of the chemicals legislation: preventing harm to people and the planet from hazardous chemicals and their toxic effects and supporting EU industry in the production of safe and sustainable chemicals. As one of the CSS actions, the European Environment Agency (EEA), the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) and the European Commission (EC) have developed an indicator framework on chemicals to support these goals. The aims of the framework are to monitor the drivers and impacts of chemical pollution and measure the effectiveness of chemicals legislation. The framework has an online dashboard (available here: https://www.eea.europa.eu/ en/european-zero-pollution-dashboards/chemicals-strategy-for-sustainability) and is accompanied by this synthesis report jointly drafted by the EEA and ECHA. Existing data streams, indicators and other information were assessed for their potential effectiveness in monitoring trends in chemicals production, use, emission, and impact. The proposed framework consists of existing and newly developed indicators and signals. The latter are more limited in terms of spatial and time coverage. Some existing indicators are also part of other related monitoring frameworks such as the zero pollution action plan. While individual indicators may not be able to measure progress on reducing the risks/unwanted impacts of chemicals directly, they should, as a whole, provide a fact-based picture to support the assessment of the effectiveness of the legislative framework for chemicals and the identification of the need for future action. However, since the impact of the current chemicals policy actions will only become apparent over time, the current dashboard and this report should be seen as a baseline."

"The EU's transition to a climate-neutral economy requires nothing short of a clean industrial revolution. This report explores the potential socioeconomic implications of such fundamental change for different European regions and population groups, following a foresight approach. Scenario-focused engagement with stakeholders and experts was conducted to gain a better understanding of emerging economic and social inequalities at EU and regional levels. The research findings are presented together with policy pointers on developing measures to achieve a just transition that leaves no one behind."

"This report highlights the major forces fostering the shift to a resource-efficient green economy in Europe, including the role of EU policies. Currently, the economic and technological changes leading towards green economy objectives across the EU economy are proceeding too slowly; what is required is a much bigger, deeper, and more permanent change in the EU economy and society to create both new opportunities and substitution processes across the economic structure. To bring this about, it is important to study and understand enabling factors and mechanisms at the crossroads of policies and real economy dynamics that could accelerate and direct the transformation."

"The 2013 Late lessons from early warnings report is the second of its type produced by the European Environment Agency (EEA) in collaboration with a broad range of external authors and peer reviewers. The case studies across both volumes of Late lessons from early warnings cover a diverse range of chemical and technological innovations, and highlight a number of systemic problems. The 'Late Lessons Project' illustrates how damaging and costly the misuse or neglect of the precautionary principle can be, using case studies and a synthesis of the lessons to be learned and applied to maximising innovations whilst minimising harms."

"Rates of endocrine diseases and disorders, such as some reproductive and developmental harm in human populations, have changed in line with the growth of the chemical industry, leading to concerns that these factors may be linked. For example, the current status of semen quality in the few European countries where studies have been systematically conducted, is very poor: fertility in approximately 40 % of men is impaired. There is also evidence of reproductive and developmental harm linked to impairments in endocrine function in a number of wildlife species, particularly in environments that are contaminated by cocktails of chemicals that are in everyday use. Based on the human and wildlife evidence, many scientists are concerned about chemical pollutants being able to interfere with the normal functioning of hormones, so-called endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), that could play a causative role in these diseases and disorders. If this holds true, then these 'early warnings' signal a failure in environmental protection that should be addressed."

"This report presents an overview of the progress achieved so far by the EU, its Member States and other EEA member countries towards their respective targets under the Kyoto Protocol and the EU burden-sharing agreement. The assessment is based on greenhouse gas emission data in Europe for 2008, the first year of the Kyoto Protocol's first commitment period which runs from 2008 to 2012. The recent availability of 2009 emissions estimates for the EU and a limited number of countries broadens, in these cases, the basis of the assessment to two years of the five-year commitment period."