European Union News - Environmnet

The European Commission has adopted a Communication describing a set of initiatives aimed at achieving a more competitive European maritime and marine sectors and at ensuring their sustainable growth. Commission's document analyses the potential for growth ans competitiveness which marine and maritime sectors as a whole can make to the European economy through innovative activities such as marine energy or biotechnology.

The European Parliament endorsed a new EU energy efficiency directive that includes measures such as renovating public buildings, energy-saving schemes for utilities, and energy audits for all large firms. Furthermore, energy companies covered by the directive will have to achieve a "cumulative end-use energy savings target" by 2020.

The figures published by the European Environment Agency (EEA) shows that greenhouse gas emissions from the European Union (EU) fell by 2.5% last year. The EEA highlights that the main reasons for the decrease in emissions were a milder winter in most parts of the EU, which resulted in lower heating demand from households, and reduced natural gas consumption.

The Joint Research Centre published a report which shows that following extraction of unconventional gas in the US, greater supplies of liquefied natural gas have become available at global level, indirectly influencing EU gas prices. The study also suggests that future shale gas production in Europe could help the EU maintain its dependency on energy imports at around 50% of its total energy needs.

Per capita CO2 emissions in China reach EU levels in 2011, according to what it was reported by the Joint Research Centre. In particular, in China, the world’s most populous country, average emissions of CO2 increased by 9% to 7.2 tonnes per capita. In the European Union, CO2 emissions dropped by 3% to 7.5 tonnes per capita. The United States remain one of the largest emitters of CO2, with 17.3 tonnes per capita.

Businesses will be allowed to use carbon units from the Australian emissions trading scheme or the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) for compliance under either system, under the new agreement reached between Australia and European Commission.

The European Environment Agency (EEA) published a report on the eve of the World Water Week (26 - 31 August), which recommends better integration of coordinated spatial planning and water management within the European Union.

A team of researchers funded in part with EU funds have discovered that energy produced from the planet's oceans can increase twofold when novel methods for predicting wave power are used. In particular, they developed a way to accurately predict the power of the next wave to extract more energy than double what is generated today. Even though, researchers believe that more subsidies are needed in this field to continue the research.