Poland has concluded negotiations on behalf of EU member states with the European Parliament for a revised carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), ahead of handing over the bloc's six-month rotating presidency to Denmark at the end of June.
But Warsaw will not lead discussions on the EU's emissions cut target for 2040 and the bloc's updated nationally determined contribution (NDC) to the Paris climate agreement.
Leading negotiations for EU states with parliament, Poland's deputy climate minister Krzysztof Bolesta said the revised CBAM would exempt 90pc of originally covered EU companies from reporting obligations, while 99pc of emissions embedded in imported products would remain covered.
The agreement on CBAM now has to be formally approved by parliament and EU ministers. Once published in the bloc's official journal, the revised CBAM text will exempt importers that do not exceed a new single mass-based threshold of 50 t/yr of imported goods.
Bolesta admitted that progress has been held up on concluding the EU's NDC during Warsaw's presidency of EU ministerial meetings. CBAM was also listed by Bolesta as one of the points for flexibility in discussions on the 2040 climate target, alongside carbon credits under Article 6 of the Paris agreement, additional funding and flexibility between climate sub-targets.
At a meeting of environment ministers yesterday, Bolesta indicated that most states still favour the European Commission linking its submission of an EU NDC to the UN — which includes a 2035 emissions cut target — with the bloc's planned 2 July proposal for a 2040 EU climate target.
The CBAM yesterday contributed to delays in technical negotiations held in Bonn, Germany, for the UN Cop 30 climate conference in Brazil. The Like-Minded Group of Developing Countries, including countries such as Bolivia, China, Saudi Arabia, Cuba and Vietnam, had urged the need to address concerns "with climate change-related trade-restrictive unilateral measures".
Despite "very, very divergent views", EU member states agree that it "is absolutely urgent to come up with an NDC before the end of September", Bolesta said. The Polish presidency of the EU, chairing climate ministers' meetings, has advanced NDC work as much as possible in the absence of the commission's proposal to revise the bloc's climate law. "We really have only a couple of months to come up with something. What lacks in the NDC draft is now the headline target," Bolesta said.
Countries have not yet discussed the quality of Article 6 offsets, Bolesta added. "Everyone in the room realises that we need to be very stringent on what kind of offset will be let into the system," he said.
EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra is "cautiously optimistic" that a landing ground can be found on the 2040 climate target. He called for more assertive climate diplomacy, as a large part of the problem lies outside Europe. For China, Hoekstra noted unfair trade practices and "serious" concerns about plans to build additional coal-fired plants. "It's a mixed bag. And we invite them to step up their ambition," he said.
