German environment secretary Matthias Machnig called for the automobile industry to develop cooler cars in a bid to get more drivers to swap to "greener" vehicles, at a Fabian fringe. Asked about whether Germany and the UK needed to tackle citizens dependency on cars to reduce CO2 emissions, Machnig suggested the solution was about developing greener cars. "It is not about the fuel price.The key is the CO2 standards."
UK Secretary of State for the Environment Hilary Benn, Paul McAleavey of the European Environment Agency and Graham Wynne of RSPB speaking at a Fabian Society and FES fringe at Labour Party Conference agreed with German Federal Minister of State for the Environment Mathias Machnig that the EU had a clear role to play in tackling climate change.
"We are the engine of this process, without the EU, without clear targeting, we are not going anywhere. We have to make that clear. We need to make a difference in economic development for the next few years."
Meeting the challenge of climate change would require not simply moral, but economically sound, arguments, he said.
"People will say to us – you are the regions that caused 90-95% of the problems of climate change. You have to do more because it is your duty. We have to think, what is an economic answer to the environmental thesis? …Becoming the most energy and resource efficient area of the world will make us the most competitive."
If the EU can demonstrate such arguments, regions like Brazil and China would want to join a post Kyoto agreement and growing sustainable development would be possible, he said. Machnig also mentioned the role of EU and specifically German exports of environmentally friendly technologies, such as for renewable energy, as key to this process, given the future importance of such markets to a low-carbon global economy.
Paul McAleavey though warned against the slowness and inadequacy of EU institutions, suggesting that important steps were still required to make the EU's processes more efficient. Hilary Benn was also careful to note that the EU, while central to efforts to construct a low-carbon economy not least through regulation of EU energy markets, should not be seen as a panacea, or used as a scapegoat for action at the national level.
One area that all participants agreed warranted further work was in the nexus of agriculture, a traditional area of interest for the EU, and energy, an area of growing importance for action at the regional level, and that this would prove a fruitful starting point for thinking further about an 'Environmental Union'.
