Activities of Mick WALLACE related to 2022/2053(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
Sustainable carbon cycles (short presentation)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on sustainable carbon cycles
Amendments (106)
Amendment 1 #
Draft opinion
Recital A a (new)
Recital A a (new)
A a. whereas the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change clearly stresses the priority of emissions reductions over carbon removals, and the sequential role of carbon removals to first supplement emission reductions, then balance out minimal residual emissions to reach net- zero, and finally to remove more GHG than are emitted to achieve net-negative GHG emissions;
Amendment 4 #
Draft opinion
Recital A b (new)
Recital A b (new)
A b. whereas carbon dioxide removals that do not result in permanent storage out of the atmosphere are delayed emissions;
Amendment 6 #
Draft opinion
Recital B
Recital B
B. whereas the development and deployment at scale of carbon removal solutions iss are indispensable to climate neutrality and requires significant targeted support over the next decade for carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS);
Amendment 8 #
Draft opinion
Recital B a (new)
Recital B a (new)
B a. whereas the permanence of sequestered carbon is difficult to guarantee; whereas monitoring and liability for reversals cannot be guaranteed for a minimum of 200 to 300 years and places an enormous burden on future generations; whereas extreme weather events such as droughts and forest fires, which are increasing due to climate change, can kill off planted forests, and underground storage sites could leak; whereas changes in land management practices can undo carbon removal; whereas counting on removals that fail to materialise or are easily reversible could undermine the Union’s climate efforts and its international credibility, and/or provide a dangerous distraction from prioritising and investing in emission reductions;
Amendment 12 #
Draft opinion
Recital B b (new)
Recital B b (new)
B b. insists that carbon removals cannot be equated to GHG emissions reduction, and must be regulated separately, stresses that emissions and removals should not be treated at policy level as tonne-for-tonne equivalent; believes instead that demand for removal units should be created through a separate target for carbon removals and that demand for removals should not come from actors that still have scope to reduce their emissions and polluting companies should not be allowed to use removal offsets (including uncertain and reversible offsets in the land use sector such as carbon in soils or forests) as a means of avoiding carbon pricing or emissions cuts in their own value chains;
Amendment 15 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1 a. welcomes the Commission's commitment in its Sustainable Carbon Cycles Communication that deep emission reductions take priority over carbon removals; stresses that drastic emission reductions are required this decade in order to keep global warming within the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit; stresses that carbon removals are only part of the solution to climate change but should not substitute actions to reduce emissions; stresses removals need to complement emission reductions, not undermine them, that carbon sinks must also be increased, but only in addition to deep emissions cuts;
Amendment 17 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 13 a (new)
Citation 13 a (new)
— having regard to the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) Sustainable Use of Wild Species Assessment report of 8 July 2022;
Amendment 18 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 1 b (new)
Paragraph 1 b (new)
1 b. expresses concern in relation to the Commission’s suggestion to turn CO2 from a waste to a resource and use it as feedstock for the production of chemicals, plastics or fuels;
Amendment 21 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 a (new)
Citation 15 a (new)
— having regard to the UN Environment Programme’s Emissions Gap Report 2021, published on 26 October 2021;
Amendment 22 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 b (new)
Citation 15 b (new)
— having regard to the European Parliament resolution of 28 November 2019 on the climate and environment emergency;
Amendment 23 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Reiterates that the European Climate Law sets the goal of climate neutrality by 2050, and recognises the need to drastically reduce carbon reliancethe use of fossil carbon;
Amendment 25 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 c (new)
Citation 15 c (new)
— having regard to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports, particularly the Special Report of 8 October 2018 on Global Warming of 1.5 °C and the Sixth Assessment Reports (AR6), Climate Change: 2021: The Physical Science Basis, publish on 9 August 2021, Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability, published on 28 February 2022 and Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, published on 4 April 2022, the Special Report of 24 September 2019 on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate, and the Special Report of 8 August 2019 on Climate Change and Land;
Amendment 26 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 d (new)
Citation 15 d (new)
— having regard to the Global Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) of 31 May 2019 on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services;
Amendment 27 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 e (new)
Citation 15 e (new)
— having regard to the European Court of Auditors special report 13/2020 of 5 June 2020 entitled 'Biodiversity on farmland: CAP contribution has not halted the decline';
Amendment 28 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15 f (new)
Citation 15 f (new)
— having regard to its resolution of 28 April 2021 on soil protection;
Amendment 31 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Stresses the need for additional and prior further research for CCS and other carbon capturing technologies, to ensure that they are realistic and do not have negative environmental or other impacts; Reiterates the role of Horizon Europe missions and the European Innovation Council in researching breakthrough technologies; and applying the do no harm principle;
Amendment 38 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A
Recital A
A. whereas agriculture and food policies need to be radically transformed to facilitate the transition to sustainable food systems in line with the ambitions of the European Green Deal for a climate- neutral EU economy in 2050;
Amendment 41 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
Amendment 43 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A a (new)
Recital A a (new)
Aa. whereas the climate emergency calls for reducing greenhouse gas emissions as much and as fast as possible, including by phasing out fossil sources of carbon, to enable the EU to reach climate neutrality well before 2050, and achieving net-negative emissions thereafter;
Amendment 47 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A b (new)
Recital A b (new)
Ab. whereas the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change clearly stresses the priority of emissions reductions over carbon removals, and the sequential role of carbon removals to first supplement emission reductions, then balance out minimal residual emissions to reach net- zero, and finally to remove more GHG than are emitted to achieve net-negative GHG emissions;
Amendment 49 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A c (new)
Recital A c (new)
Ac. whereas carbon dioxide removals that do not result in permanent storage out of the atmosphere are delayed emissions;
Amendment 50 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5 a (new)
Paragraph 5 a (new)
5 a. stresses that CCU that results in the CO2 being emitted to the atmosphere at any point during the use or disposal of the product is not carbon dioxide removal but a delayed CO2 emission, regardless of the CO2 origin;
Amendment 50 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A d (new)
Recital A d (new)
Amendment 52 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 5 b (new)
Paragraph 5 b (new)
5 b. stresses that carbon capture technologies such as CCS and CCU applied to industrial installations cannot be considered as carbon dioxide removals, since carbon dioxide removals can only be achieved through the capture and permanent storage of atmospheric (including biogenic) CO2, not by preventing CO2 from entering the atmosphere;
Amendment 52 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital B
Recital B
B. whereas sustainable carbon cycles must be considered in a holistic manner, as increasing biological carbon sinks and replacing fossil carbon as much as possible will require more biomass production, thus affecting the land sector; whereas carbon farming schemes can be part of an incentivising market-based toolbox for delivering on climaterisks affecting the land sector in a negative manner unless biodiversity and ecosystem services are fully considered; whereas nature restoration is critical for responding to multiple global crises, including biodiversity loss, climate change and carbon farming cannot substitute urgent and deep emission reductions; whereas carbon farming schemes can be part of delivering on biodiversity and nature restoration objectives;
Amendment 58 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
Amendment 65 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital C
Recital C
C. whereas every tonne of fossil CO2 that is not emitted or is or will be sustainably stored in cycles is the best contribution to achieving climate targets; whereas storing CO2 from the atmosphere or other cycles should be used as one among many methods for achieving climate targets; whereas preventing emissions at source is crucial for effective climate action; whereas the best way to achieve the Paris Agreement 1.5 degree Celsius target is to not emit greenhouse gases and to leave fossil fuels in the ground; whereas the safest and most permanent store we have is the geologic storage of fossil fuels where the carbon has been kept out of the atmosphere for millions of years;
Amendment 73 #
Draft opinion
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
Amendment 79 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D
Recital D
D. whereas carbon removal plays a crucial role in achieving a climate-neutral EU economy by 2050, as they can balancewell-before 2050, provided that the remissions that are very difficult to eliminateovals are additional to emission reductions and careate a new market-based incom only used to balance source for farmert the very last residual emissions;
Amendment 92 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
Amendment 102 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E a (new)
Recital E a (new)
Ea. whereas the IUCN has declared 160 species to be extinct over the last decade alone and that no level of restoration will be able to bring back extinct species; whereas IPBES estimates that globally 1 million species is at risk of extinction as well;
Amendment 107 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E b (new)
Recital E b (new)
Eb. whereas the family farm model is vital to the future of agriculture and rural communities in the EU; whereas the number of farms in the EU decreased by about one quarter in the relatively short period between 2005 and 2016 of which the vast majority were small family farms;
Amendment 110 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E c (new)
Recital E c (new)
Ec. whereas pursuing an objective of ‘climate neutrality’ is not a decarbonisation strategy, it just implies that emissions are acceptable as long as they are offset elsewhere; whereas the climate neutrality approach to climate action paves the way for creative accounting, greenwashing, as well as the pursuit of techno-fix solutions to combat an emergency which quite literally jeopardises human existence on this planet;
Amendment 113 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E d (new)
Recital E d (new)
Amendment 116 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E e (new)
Recital E e (new)
Ee. whereas the IPCC AR6 WG1 (SPM) concludes that greenhouse gas emissions could have long-lasting repercussions on life on Earth that removals would not be able to “clean up” or “compensate” for;
Amendment 117 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E f (new)
Recital E f (new)
Ef. whereas removals will not undo every impact of the climate breakdown, such as continued rising sea levels; whereas climate breakdown is compounded by any climate tipping points that are triggered; whereas removals will not undo such tipping points or their impacts on societies and the environment;
Amendment 118 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E g (new)
Recital E g (new)
Eg. whereas there is no definition of carbon removal in existing EU legislation, nor in the Paris Agreement;
Amendment 119 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E h (new)
Recital E h (new)
Eh. whereas half of all agricultural emissions take place outside of the farm and are largely driven by agri-businesses, including through the manufacturing of synthetic fertilisers and pesticides;
Amendment 120 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E i (new)
Recital E i (new)
Ei. whereas by focusing on short-term climate goals and ignoring other metrics, such as biodiversity, water quality and soil health, carbon offsets maintain or incentivise practices that are detrimental to real climate ambition;
Amendment 121 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E j (new)
Recital E j (new)
Ej. whereas offsetting schemes fail to promote the required long-term structural changes in agricultural systems, including transitioning to agroecology, shifting feed production and processing and reducing herd sizes;
Amendment 122 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E k (new)
Recital E k (new)
Amendment 123 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E l (new)
Recital E l (new)
El. whereas according to the IPCC AR6 WG1 SMR the atmospheric CO2 decrease from anthropogenic CO2 removals could be up to 10% less than the atmospheric CO2 increase from an equal amount of CO2 emissions, depending on the total amount of CDR1a; _________________ 1a https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/downl oads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGI_SPM.pdf, p30
Amendment 124 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E m (new)
Recital E m (new)
Em. whereas the different timescales of fossil and biogenic carbon fluxes mean that emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are not fungible with nature-based removals; whereas the fossil cycle lasts approximately 100-200 million years and the biogenic carbon cycle typically lasts from a few years to a few decades; whereas an emission, especially a fossil emission, is permanent in nature, and no nature-based removal can have the same certainty as an emission with regards to permanence;
Amendment 125 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E n (new)
Recital E n (new)
En. whereas permanent carbon removal would technically entail a timeline in geological terms (thousands of years), but practically – as removals are at the very least needed for humanity to have dealt with the climate crisis – a minimum timeframe of 2-3 centuries needs to be considered with regards to ‘permanence’ of storage;
Amendment 126 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E o (new)
Recital E o (new)
Eo. whereas the permanence of sequestered carbon is difficult to guarantee; whereas monitoring and liability for reversals cannot be guaranteed for a minimum of 200 to 300 years and places an enormous burden on future generations; whereas extreme weather events such as droughts and forest fires, which are increasing due to climate change, can kill off planted forests, and underground storage sites could leak; whereas changes in land management practices can undo carbon removal; whereas counting on removals that fail to materialise or are easily reversible could undermine the Union’s climate efforts and its international credibility, and/or provide a dangerous distraction from prioritising and investing in emission reductions;
Amendment 127 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E p (new)
Recital E p (new)
Ep. whereas carbon removals and sequestration cannot be scaled up infinitely, as Union and global storage capacity, energy and land are limited; whereas this distributive aspect of carbon removal in particular will be complex and controversial, as many economic sectors will claim to be the last emissions that cannot be abated, but not all can be; whereas the allocation of carbon credits in a climate-neutral world is also a question of justice and equality;
Amendment 128 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital Eq (new)
Recital Eq (new)
Eq. whereas IPBES estimates that 90% of land is projected to be significantly altered by 2050 and 75% of land has already been significantly altered; whereas 85% of wetlands areas have already been lost;
Amendment 129 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E r (new)
Recital E r (new)
Er. whereas climate change and the collapse of biodiversity are intimately connected crises sharing some root causes and solutions, and interacting through complex feedback loops;
Amendment 132 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Acknowledges the contribution of the sustainable carbon cycles initiative to reaching the EU net carbon removal target of 310 megatons (Mt) by 2030, as mentioned in the Commission communication on sustainable carbon cycles; in this context, recalls the importance of avoiding double counting in order to maintain the environmental integrity of the European climate policy framework;
Amendment 135 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Stresses that biodiversity and nature should not be merely considered as 'natural capital' or considered only in relation to their use value to humans, but should instead be recognised as a common heritage of all on this planet of incalculable value; calls for an approach to biodiversity and nature that protects and restores it also for its intrinsic value in and of itself; rejects any attempt to monetise nature or calculate its value; believes any such attempt is only detrimental to nature;
Amendment 137 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 b (new)
Paragraph 1 b (new)
1b. Welcomes the increased transparency and improvement in climate accounting that will result from ensuring that each tonne of CO2 captured, transported, used and stored will be reported and accounted for by its fossil, biogenic or atmospheric origin by 2028, which will ensure that captured industrial emissions are correctly labelled as fossil or biological, depending on their ultimate origin, and not based on a snapshot of a segment of a value chain; stresses that such reporting should also include the fate of the CO2, in order to identify permanent storage, delayed emissions to the atmosphere and direct emissions to the atmosphere;
Amendment 138 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 c (new)
Paragraph 1 c (new)
Amendment 139 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 d (new)
Paragraph 1 d (new)
1d. Stresses that removals in the LULUCF sector should only complement and never replace legally binding emissions reductions under other climate instruments; insists that voluntary credits issued in the EU and claimed by non-state actors or non-EU countries should lead to a commensurate adjustment to EU LULUCF targets, thereby guaranteeing that voluntary carbon markets complement regulatory action and avoid double credit claiming;
Amendment 140 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 e (new)
Paragraph 1 e (new)
1e. Emphasises that the EU should aim to achieve negative emissions in addition to emissions reductions in order to avoid a dependency on future negative emissions that might never be achieved; insists net-zero should not be the ultimate EU climate objective, but instead should be a stepping stone on the way to achieving net-negative emissions; insists that removals should be counted towards a separate removal target to ensure they do not slow down economy-wide decarbonisation efforts;
Amendment 141 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 f (new)
Paragraph 1 f (new)
1f. Calls on the Commission to provide a clear, unambiguous, science- based, legal definition of carbon removal to ensure only real removal activities are eligible for any carbon credit certification scheme; calls on the Commission to base its definition on the following key principles: that physical greenhouse gases are removed from the atmosphere; that the removed greenhouse gases are stored out of the atmosphere in a manner intended to be permanent; that upstream and downstream greenhouse gases associated with the removal and storage process are comprehensively estimated and included in the emission balance; that the total quantity of atmospheric greenhouse gases removed and permanently stored is greater than the total quantity of greenhouse gases emitted to the atmosphere; calls on the Commission to exclude from this definition of real carbon removals carbon captured at fossil fuel point sources, CCS with EOR/EGR and even if using DAC, and temporary storage from CCU, for example synthetic fuels; calls on the Commission to also exclude activities that only store carbon temporarily from this definition, including nature-based sequestration; insists that nature-based activities should not all qualify as removals and should not be permitted to generate credits for offset claims; calls on the Commission and Member States to support and encourage nature-based activities, but stresses that these should not be considered equivalent to permanent removals and therefore should not be used for offsetting;
Amendment 142 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 g (new)
Paragraph 1 g (new)
1g. Underlines that dangerous climate change cannot be prevented without rapid and deep emission reductions;
Amendment 149 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 h (new)
Paragraph 1 h (new)
1h. Reminds that, in order for carbon removals to play a helpful role in fighting climate change, and to reduce mitigation deterrence, removals need to be addressed under a separate target and scaled up through separate policy instruments;
Amendment 150 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 i (new)
Paragraph 1 i (new)
1i. Stresses that robust monitoring, reporting and verification of the actual environmental and social impact of any carbon cycle or carbon removal method or process will be critical to ensure it actually delivers on EU climate and biodiversity goals; insists it must be made clear where the carbon comes from (atmospheric, biogenic or fossil) and where it ends up (permanent storage, or delayed or direct emission to the atmosphere); insists that impacts should be accounted for on the basis of a comprehensive life-cycle assessment, and include for example: climate mitigation and adaptation, land, energy, water and material use, biodiversity impacts, quality and health of forests, and land grabbing effects;
Amendment 151 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 j (new)
Paragraph 1 j (new)
1j. Insists that carbon removals cannot be equated to GHG emissions reduction, and must be regulated separately, stresses that emissions and removals should not be treated at policy level as tonne-for-tonne equivalent; believes instead that demand for removal units should be created through a separate target for carbon removals and that demand for removals should not come from actors that still have scope to reduce their emissions and polluting companies should not be allowed to use removal offsets (including uncertain and reversible offsets in the land use sector such as carbon in soils or forests) as a means of avoiding carbon pricing or emissions cuts in their own value chains;
Amendment 153 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Stresses that the agricultural and forestry sectors can play a significant role in this process, given that they have the capacity to remove and store carbon through carbon reservoir use and management, but that these ecosystems need to be urgently protected and restored, and consequently monitored for biodiversity and permanence; underlines that the agricultural and forestry sector have a responsibility to contribute to the overall goal to be the first climate- neutral continent;
Amendment 159 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2 a (new)
Paragraph 2 a (new)
2a. Welcomes the Commission's commitment in its Sustainable Carbon Cycles Communication that deep emission reductions take priority over carbon removals; stresses that drastic emission reductions are required this decade in order to keep global warming within the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit; stresses that carbon removals are only part of the solution to climate change but should not substitute actions to reduce emissions; stresses that removals need to complement and emission reductions, not undermine them, and that carbon sinks must also be increased, but only in addition to deep emissions cuts;
Amendment 167 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Stresses that each sector, including agriculture and forestry, must first and foremost reduce its own CO2 emissions independently and only use the storage capacity of other sectors, such as agriculture and forestry, for non- reduciblecarbon dioxide removals for a minimal volume of residual emissions;
Amendment 176 #
4. Emphasises that sustainable food production and the availability of renewable raw materials remain the primary objective of agriculture and forestry; underlines that both sectors are themselves both contributing to and being massively affected by climate change;
Amendment 195 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Recognises that the Commission communication on sustainable carbon cycles sets out the first steps towards regulating carbon sinks, carbon removal and recyclingremoval and eliminating the reliance on fossil carbon;
Amendment 202 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6 a (new)
Paragraph 6 a (new)
6a. Expresses concern that the Communication conflates delayed emissions, recycling of carbon and removals without sufficient clarity on the differences in their roles and needs;
Amendment 208 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
7. Emphasises that the blue carbon economy could contribute to the storage of CO2 ackling coastal regionslimate breakdown after careful research; encourages the Commission to collect knowledge and data on blue carbon capture;
Amendment 218 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 8
Paragraph 8
8. Invites the industry sectors involved in carbon cycling to come forward with innovative solutions and initiatives aiming to gradually replace fossil carbon with sustainable streams of recycled carbonphase out fossil carbon and reduce carbon emissions;
Amendment 240 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
Amendment 257 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading II a (new)
Subheading II a (new)
IIa. Notes that transitioning to agroecology and restoring ecosystems are knowledge-intensive processes with high up-front costs, requiring significant investments; believes carbon markets, due to their volatility, are ill-suited to provide the type of support and stable income that the vast majority of farmers would need to undertake this transition; stresses that farmers must be supported to make this transition;
Amendment 263 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 b (new)
Paragraph 9 b (new)
9b. Notes that cheap carbon farming credits can disincentivise emissions abatement and provide too little compensation to farmers, especially those with less economy of scale, making more ambitious management changes, including agroforestry and peatland rewetting unattractive; believes that current carbon farming credit prices are far too low to finance the transition to agroecology;
Amendment 265 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 c (new)
Paragraph 9 c (new)
9c. Notes that voluntary carbon markets in agriculture have both high project implementation and transaction costs; acknowledges therefore that offsetting projects are profitable only at large scales, thereby promoting land concentration and disadvantaging smaller and more diversified farms;
Amendment 266 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 d (new)
Paragraph 9 d (new)
Amendment 267 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 e (new)
Paragraph 9 e (new)
9e. Insists the EU carbon farming initiative must not encourage the use of agricultural carbon offsets; or the use of offsets for agricultural products, given the significant uncertainties associated with such projects, but should rather establish a mechanism to provide adequate financial support and incentives to help farmers transition to agroecology;
Amendment 268 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 f (new)
Paragraph 9 f (new)
9f. Calls on the Commission to prioritise public funding and privately funded, non-market-based, collaboration- based carbon farming financing, such as action-based or practice-based financing; considers that action-based finance would be more appropriate than results-based finance to support the uptake of land management practices that are environmentally beneficial, including for biodiversity, climate change mitigation and adaptation, soil quality and water retention;
Amendment 269 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 g (new)
Paragraph 9 g (new)
9g. Calls on the Commission to prioritise no-regret carbon farming solutions such as rewetting of drained wetlands and peatlands, agroforestry, old growth forests and reforestation;
Amendment 270 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 h (new)
Paragraph 9 h (new)
Amendment 271 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 i (new)
Paragraph 9 i (new)
9i. Stresses that where carbon farming does not result in permanent storage of removed CO2, this is equivalent to delayed emissions, and, therefore, robust monitoring and verification are fundamental to any carbon farming practice;
Amendment 272 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 j (new)
Paragraph 9 j (new)
9j. Believes that a focus on voluntary incentives will not deliver change at the scale required; believes the carbon farming initiative must deploy a coherent mix of mandatory and voluntary policy instruments, underpinned by clear definitions and safeguards, and robust accountability mechanisms; insists the post-2022 CAP must do much more to finance climate mitigation and adaptation actions and activities in agriculture and that this should be the priority; calls for fair farm gate prices and remuneration for all farmers; believes this is the best way to support a Just Transition to positive agricultural practices for climate change and biodiversity;
Amendment 274 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
Paragraph 10
10. UWelcomes the Commission’s cautious approach in relation to upscaling carbon farming before 2030, in order to gain experience and knowledge first; underlines the requirement to take into account preliminary work on this issue, Member States’ different starting points and conditions, and the effects ofthe possible adverse effects of carbon removals, carbon accounting difficulties and the effects of farming practices and climate change on the storage of carbon when evaluating climate change mitigation practices; welcomes the Commission’s commitment to standardised monitoring and reporting methodologies;
Amendment 297 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Underlines that CO2 storage is already being usemissions avoided and mitigated ion many areas through the implementation of the common agricultural policy (CAP); emphasises that the land and forestry sector have a natural maximum storage capacity; stresses that, except for storage, the conservation of carbon in the soil and emissions avoided and mitigated on farms should be considered valuable contributions to addressing ongoing climate changefarms should be considered valuable contributions to addressing ongoing climate change; recalls, as also concluded in the Commission Communication on Sustainable Carbon Cycles that there is still no scientific consensus about methodologies to measure such storage, in particular concerning its duration;
Amendment 317 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
12. Stresses that carbon farming must be regulated in line with the current CAP and be seen as a complementary and additional topping-up option; underlines, however, that in the longer term carbon farming should be market-basedinitiatives under the EU Biodiversity Strategy, including but not limited to the EU Nature Restoration Law;
Amendment 325 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12 a (new)
Paragraph 12 a (new)
12a. Calls for the mainstreaming of agroecological practice in EU agriculture and calls on the Commission to set a target of 50% of EU agricultural area to be managed through agroecological systems, including organic farming, by 2050;
Amendment 329 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12 b (new)
Paragraph 12 b (new)
12b. Expresses concern that a market- based carbon farming model will increase the concentration and the financing of land and the dependence of agricultural income on speculative and often volatile carbon markets, and that access to land for smallholders and young farmers will likely become more expensive; calls on the Commission to minimise the risk of land-grabbing and competition for land;
Amendment 333 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12 c (new)
Paragraph 12 c (new)
12c. Stresses that any carbon farming initiative should also address N20 and CH4 emissions which make up a significant share of the climate heating impact of agriculture;
Amendment 336 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12 d (new)
Paragraph 12 d (new)
12d. Welcomes the Commission’s commitment to mainstreaming carbon farming in EU public support, especially promoting it in the national CAP strategic plans and the LIFE Programme and the Cohesion Policy, whilst ensuring that there will be no double funding;
Amendment 346 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13
Paragraph 13
13. Considers that carbon capture and storage (CCS) and carbon capture and utilisation (CCU) can play a crucial role as future technologies for achieving climate neutrality in Europerole in reducing emissions if storage of carbon, including in products, is permanent, and for creating a successful decarbonised economy in Europethe EU;
Amendment 348 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13 a (new)
Paragraph 13 a (new)
13a. Stresses that CCU that results in the CO2 being emitted to the atmosphere at any point during the use or disposal of the product is not carbon dioxide removal but a delayed CO2 emission, regardless of the CO2 origin;
Amendment 349 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13 b (new)
Paragraph 13 b (new)
13b. Welcomes the Commission’s plan to study cross-border CO2 infrastructure needs and to map out relevant industrial clusters which could benefit from open- access and multi-modal CO2 transport networks to geological storage sites;
Amendment 350 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13 c (new)
Paragraph 13 c (new)
13c. Stresses that carbon capture technologies such as CCS and CCU applied to industrial installations cannot be considered as carbon dioxide removals, since carbon dioxide removals can only be achieved through the capture and permanent storage of atmospheric (including biogenic) CO2 , not by preventing CO2 from entering the atmosphere;
Amendment 351 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13 d (new)
Paragraph 13 d (new)
13d. Expresses concern in relation to the Commission’s suggestion to turn CO2 from a waste to a resource and use it as feedstock to produce chemicals, plastics or fuels;
Amendment 352 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 14
Paragraph 14
Amendment 375 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15
Paragraph 15
Amendment 394 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 a (new)
Paragraph 15 a (new)
15a. Insists that the geographical scope of any EU carbon credit certification scheme be limited to the EU;
Amendment 395 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 b (new)
Paragraph 15 b (new)
15b. Stresses that all result-based carbon removal projects, whether publicly or privately funded, should be recorded in a publicly available and easily searchable database, including information on the emitters and buyers of credits when relevant;
Amendment 397 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 c (new)
Paragraph 15 c (new)
15c. Calls on the Commission to clarify the issue of liability in any carbon certification scheme if or when carbon removals are reversed after a credit is sold or used;
Amendment 398 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 d (new)
Paragraph 15 d (new)
15d. Calls on the Commission to include both upstream and downstream greenhouse gas emissions associated with carbon removal and storage processes in any framework for the certification of carbon removals;
Amendment 399 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 e (new)
Paragraph 15 e (new)
15e. Insists that any carbon credit certification framework must not be based on carbon intensity but instead on absolute emissions reductions;
Amendment 400 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 f (new)
Paragraph 15 f (new)
15f. Calls on the Commission to devise additionality rules that are fair and do not penalise first movers in terms of applying good land management practices;
Amendment 401 #
15g. Calls for a separate target for carbon removals including technological removals to ensure the EU upscales and incentivises carbon removals without undermining emission reduction efforts;
Amendment 402 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15 h (new)
Paragraph 15 h (new)
15h. Calls on the Commission to propose a transparent certification system in which all certificates feed into the national GHG inventories, instead of being claimed as offsets by private or public actors, to ensure that the certification mechanism supports Member States and that the Union reaches the overarching targets set out in other EU legislation and avoids double counting of removals;
Amendment 413 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16
Paragraph 16
16. Emphasises the need to develop a robust, transparent new framework for the quantification and certification of carbon removals that must at the same time avoid greenwashing and false carbon leakageneutrality claims; underlines the need to only promote high- quality carbon removal certificates that can ensure the achievement of the criteria of additionality, permanence, no double counting or double monetisation and authenticity in order to incentivise improved land management practices, thus resulting in enhanced carbon capturecarbon removal;
Amendment 439 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading V
Subheading V
Funding carbon cycling
Amendment 444 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17
Paragraph 17
17. Stresses that carbon farming should be market-based and financed by public and/or private funds; calls on the Commission to create a genuinely new business model for farmers and foresters; notes that financing from the value chain or through the creation of a voluntary carbon market is possible; stresses that the CAP is not a viable source of funding, as the CAP is not a business modelthe CAP is a viable source of funding, and should be the primary source of funding for any scheme that seeks to incentivise carbon farming practices;
Amendment 465 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 18
Paragraph 18
18. Calls on the Commission to revise current funding options in order to adapt them to carbon cycle business demands;
Amendment 478 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading VI a (new)
Subheading VI a (new)
calls on Parties to the Paris Agreement to exclude the land sector from carbon markets under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement;
Amendment 492 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 22
Paragraph 22
22. Insists on the need to enhance international cooperation with third countries in order to promote European carbon cycling standards at global level and contribute to the future implementation of Article 6 (on carbon markets)achievement of the Paris Agreement;