Europe Fails to Recognize Carbon Dioxide As a Pollutant
During a recent meeting of the Environment minsters of EU member countries side stepped the issue of declaring carbon dioxide a pollutant. While the minsters agreed on a proposal to reduce industrial pollution various environment groups criticized the ministers’ inaction on what seemed an essential and significant decision in Europe’s fight against climate change.
According to the deal reached, heavy industries like power plants and oil refineries will have to comply to new and stricter sulfur and nitrogen emissions as well as the release of dust particles, asbestos and heavy metals into the environment. Obviously, carbon dioxide has been left out which is why the environmentalists have been fuming. European leaders should have sent a strong message by classifying carbon dioxide as a pollutant keeping in mind the Copenhagen Climate Talks scheduled later this year.
Classify carbon dioxide as a pollutant would have added teeth to the EU goal of 20 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2020 by adding the health aspect it. European Environment Bureau, a coalition of local environmental groups voiced its concerns saying,
This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 30th, 2009 at 11:53 pm and is filed under Environment, Global Warming, efficiency, energy conservation, green, green building. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.