EU

This study offers evidence and guidelines for the development of sustainable Operational Programmes in EU Member States in the waste management sector, the sector where most countries in central and eastern Europe seriously lag behind EU standards and achievements. As a policy analysis it tries to directly link the European Waste Framework Directive and the new Cohesion Policy Regulation by understanding the Resource Efficient Europe Initiative.

European environmental legislation contains no provisions on the exploration and exploitation of unconventional fossil fuels, most notably shale gas. To establish these, the European Commission has conducted a public consultation on whether and under which conditions shale gas exploitation can be an acceptable practice and on the benefits and threats it brings with it.

After the EIB and the EBRD disbursed a promised 650 million euros for Slovenian lignite plant TES 6 on March 8, Focus Slovenia, CEE Bankwatch Network and 96 other NGOs sent this letter to the two banks calling on them to never commit to such a misguided loan again. The letter includes a list of reasons why Sostanj was undeserving of public loans and a set of measures that need to be taken by the banks immediately in order to avoid such mistakes from being repeated in the future.

The European Investment Bank’s annual press conference in the final week of February proved to be significantly more revealing about the bank’s commitment to fueling climate change than is the norm for the EU bank.

The renovation of buildings to high energy performance standards has the potential to be the most cost effective investment any European nation can make, given the benefits in terms of job creation, quality of life, economic stimulus and energy security that such investments deliver. For these reasons the Buildings Performance Institute Europe (BPIE) is advocating for the maximum possible allocation of EU funds to the energy renovation of buildings under the recently agreed multi-annual financial framework (MFF) for 2014-2020.