Belgium racing to finish EU green laws before elections

Climate change is expected to be a central topic in the EU election as voters weigh up parties supportive of Europe's ambitious CO2-cutting agenda, and those who argue it is too costly. Maron, who is from the Green party, said voters had legitimate concerns about how green measures will affect them - which politicians must address, for example, with financial support to insulate low-income citizens' homes and reduce their energy bills.

Belgium will push for deals on six European Union environment policies by March, in a last minute attempt to boost Europe's green agenda before EU election campaigning gets underway.

Belgium took over the EU's rotating presidency this month, putting it in charge of chairing policy negotiations among the 27 EU member states. Alain Maron, environment minister for the Brussels region, who will chair talks on EU environment laws, said his aim was to complete each of the six green laws currently being negotiated.

"That is the aim, to conclude on each topic," Maron said in an interview. "The lack of time, it's not comfortable, because we have to succeed by the end of February or the very beginning of March," he added.

Among the policies are stricter CO2 emissions limits for trucks, tighter limits on health-harming air pollution, plans to certify removals of CO2 from the atmosphere, and rules on mercury and wastewater treatment. Maron singled out a law to reduce packaging waste as particularly politically sensitive. Some EU lawmakers have described heavy lobbying from industry to weaken these rules - which look set to be somewhat weakened, after EU countries agreed last month to add exemptions for certain sectors.

The EU is racing to finish negotiations between EU countries and lawmakers on a raft of policies before the EU Parliament pauses activities in April ahead of its elections on June 6-9. Climate change is expected to be a central topic in the EU election as voters weigh up parties supportive of Europe's ambitious CO2-cutting agenda, and those who argue it is too costly.

Maron, who is from the Green party, said voters had legitimate concerns about how green measures will affect them - which politicians must address, for example, with financial support to insulate low-income citizens' homes and reduce their energy bills. "We have to reduce the inequalities and use the climate transition to do it," he said.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)