On 10 January 2007, the European Commission introduced its new energy and climate change policy. This package of measures brings together diverse proposals put forward to the EU Council, which has convened in early March under the German Presidency to determine the goals of the EU's future...

The French president Nicolas Sarkozy has repeatedly advocated strengthening the European climate and energy package by imposing tariffs on imports from world regions without an ambitious climate policy. Yet for a number of reasons, it remains ambiguous how trade-related policy instruments could...

In June 2012 the international community will meet in Rio de Janeiro for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD, or Rio+20). One of the two main themes will be the »green economy in the context of sustainable development and poverty eradication«. To date, however,...

The seventeenth Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) agreed in December 2011 that a new comprehensive climate agreement should be negotiated by 2015. Moreover, in Durban, South Africa, the international community also decided that a...

In a push for climate protection in the US, the United States Environmental Protection Agency has proposed new CO2 emission limits for power plants. This is the next step in President Barack Obama's agenda on tackling climate change and the measures taken by the US administration are highly...

Chinese government officials have repeatedly declared that China - now the world's biggest greenhouse gas emitter - wants to take on more responsibility for climate policy at the international level. Chinese emissions targets were announced in July at the Petersberg Climate Dialogue, but were...

International negotiations over a post-2020 climate agreement have brought increased calls for India to participate in climate protection efforts. India is currently in a paradoxical situation. On the one hand, in demanding financial and technological support for climate policy, India shares the...

In October 2014, the European Union has announced the objective of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to at least 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030. On March 6, 2015, the Council of Environmental Ministers reported this target as the EU's official contribution to the ongoing climate talks...