Tuesday 14 July 2020

Germany commits to making its EU Council presidency climate-neutral

Germany commits to making its EU Council presidency climate-neutral

The German Government has pledged to make all the events during its European Council presidency climate-neutral.

Germany took over the presidency of the EU Council on 1st July and will hold it for six months.

It is estimated during this period the government will host more than 400 planned events, which will be organised with sustainability criteria set out by the Federal Environment Agency and the Federal Ministry for Environment.

These criteria will include sustainable locations for events, waste management, catering and travel options for guests.

Venues which run on green electricity and have relevant environmental certificates will be prioritised for the events, while the carbon footprint of the catering will be reduced by offering seasonal foods from organic farms.

The government also plans to purchase carbon offsets for the unavoidable emissions which will arise from the travel of the events' participants.

This is expected to support high-quality climate protection projects, which have been certified according to the UN framework.

Environment Minister Svenja Schulze said: "It is important that we not only campaign politically for a sustainable and climate-neutral economy and way of life, we also need to act accordingly.

Therefore the Federal Government has developed a way to apply sustainability to all the events can be implemented during our EU Council presidency."

Written by

Bruna Pinhoni

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