Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-06-06-Speech-1-078"
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"en.20050606.13.1-078"2
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".
Madam President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, that the Commission should present this proposal for a directive on energy efficiency and energy services was a matter of urgent necessity.
This House had already, and repeatedly, called on the Commission to respond to the creation of the single internal market in electricity and gas by proposing concrete measures to deal with demand, the minimal use we at present make of what is almost our largest energy resource being indefensible. All reputable studies indicate that total energy end-use consumption in the European Union could be reduced by between 20% and 30% without harming the economy or reducing comfort; the technology available makes savings of over 40% possible.
Knowing as we do that we are increasingly dependent on imports, some of them from regions in crisis, and that our current use of energy is a significant factor in climate problems, we are obliged to get started with a real policy for energy efficiency and energy saving. As Commissioner Piebalgs said, that also means a policy that deals with climate change, a policy for improving security of supply, and a policy for something that is part of the Lisbon strategy, namely the creation of many new jobs. Hundreds and thousands of new jobs are to be created in this sector.
So I really am grateful to the Commission for producing this directive, and to Commissioner Piebalgs; I really do appreciate, Commissioner, your desire – which you have expressed on many occasions – to attach such special importance to energy efficiency, and to present a Green Paper on the subject before long.
In this proposal for a directive, the Commission has – as the Commissioner has just said – put forward binding targets, and I am glad that the Committee has done as I suggested and kept these targets binding; indeed, it has gone further in making appropriate increases to the targets proposed by the Commission, whilst allowing the Member States the greater flexibility of reporting on three periods of three years each rather than on an annual basis. If, as the Commissioner has just said, the Commission wants to give rather greater emphasis to the top-down model, the targets will have to be the subject of renewed discussion, for the more the top-down approach is adopted, the higher the targets will have to be. The initial line taken by the Committee is that we want to keep doing things from the bottom up.
None of the Member States will find it difficult to make energy savings of between 3% and 4.5% by means of concrete measures over a period of three years. Let me state again, for the sake of clarity, that it is not the total energy consumption that is to be reduced; rather, the intention is that the concrete measures ensure that savings can be made, so that if, for example, total energy consumption increases in line with economic development, the increase would have been greater had these measures not been in place. Matters will also be made easier for some Member States by the calculation taking into account the continuing effects of saving measures taken earlier.
We also – and this too is important – agree with the Commission that the public services should lead by example – a role laid down for them already in other directives. I am confident that this House’s vote tomorrow will send a clear message to the Council, and will call on it not to take refuge in the ‘take it or leave it’ approach. I am also confident that we can do this with a broad majority.
I would like to take this opportunity to say a really very big thank you to the shadow rapporteurs – Mr Vidal-Quadras Roca, Mrs Hall, and Mr Turmes – for their cooperation, which was really excellent and also resulted in the drafting of a compromise, which we are putting before you. The Committee had, in its voting, to decide between two approaches: one was the one I have already described, which involves the Member States taking action to meet clear and binding targets, and the other was that of applying benchmarks. We have already put before you a compromise providing, in the first instance, for binding targets to be applicable, to be followed by the setting of benchmarks in all areas, which – time-consuming and far from simple though this will be – will enable the targets to be met."@en1
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