Document Actions
Published: 13 Dec 2010
What we know about Europe’s environment
comes from data collected by countless data
providers. The Belgian Presidency of the
European Union and the European Environment
Agency (EEA) organised a conference to facilitate
the sharing of environmental information.
The conference ‘Sharing
Environmental Information’, held between
29 November and 1 December in Brussels,
brought together representatives from the
EEA member and cooperating countries, EEA
and the European Commission. The participants
reflected on the implementation of the Shared
Environmental Information System (SEIS).
In the conference conclusions,
the participants encouraged the European
Commission to publish the SEIS Implementation
Plan as soon as possible. They also emphasised
the benefits of mutually supportive interaction
between SEIS, Infrastructure for Spatial
Information in Europe (INSPIRE) and Global
Monitoring for Environment and Security
(GMES) processes. The participants also
recommended that SEIS, through the use of
relevant Information Communication Technology
(ICT), should be closely connected to the
digital agenda for Europe as part of the
EU strategy 2020.
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COP16: Climate talks
set the way forward
Document Actions
Published: 16 Dec 2010
Two-week long negotiations on a global climate
deal ended with a balanced and substantive
package of decisions adopted on 11 December,
known as the Cancún Agreement. The
European Union welcomed the positive outcome
of the COP16 conference and stressed that
it is willing to do its fair share of the
global effort.
The Cancún Agreement
builds on the decisions taken a year ago
in Copenhagen and also sets out processes
for making further progress in the future.
It represents a compromise between different
interests within the United Nations system.
The European Union has
set itself ambitious climate and energy
targets for 2020 but is also looking at
the long term. Next spring the European
Commission will present a strategy for completing
the transition to a low-carbon economy by
2050. The strategy will aim at stimulating
economic growth, job creation and innovation
while strengthening the EU's energy security.
The Cancún Agreement
acknowledges for the first time in a United
Nations document that global warming must
be kept below 2°C compared to the pre-industrial
temperature and establishes a process to
define a date for global emissions to peak
and a global emissions reduction goal for
2050. The text also recognises that overall
mitigation efforts need to be scaled up
in order to stay within the 2°C ceiling.
The agreement also confirms
the goal that developed countries will mobilise
US$ 100 billion in climate funding for developing
countries annually by 2020, and establishment
of a Green Climate Fund through which much
of the funding will be channelled. Furthermore
the agreement includes ‘Cancún Adaptation
Framework’ to enhance action on adaptation
to climate change and the launch of a "REDD+"
mechanism enabling action to reduce emissions
from deforestation and forest degradation
in developing countries.
