The European Commission has published today, 24 April 2012, a "non-paper" drafted by its services concerning the proposal for an Energy Efficiency Directive. The non-paper reflects the state of play of the discussions on the proposal for directive ahead of the Informal Energy Meeting of EU Ministers of 19-20 April 2012 (although the document was publicly released after the meeting). The non-paper presents new estimates in terms of reduced primary energy consumption based on the Council's version of the proposed directive dated 4 April 2012.
Without saying it, the Commission's staff tries to demonstrate that the Council's version of the text will only reach a third of the original objectives:
"The Council's version of the Directive is thus estimated to reduce primary energy consumption by about 58.1 Mtoe while the Commission's proposal would deliver a savings of 151.5 Mtoe, which is needed to close the gap (along with measures in the transport sector) to achieve the 20% target. The impact of the Council version would therefore represent 38% of the expected impact of the Commission's proposal."
The proposal for a directive has been adopted by the Commission on 22 June 2011, and the ITRE Committee of the European Parliament has adopted a draft report on 4 October 2011. The Council is to examine again the proposal on 15 June 2012, and the Parliament is expected to vote in 1st reading on 2 July 2012, depending on the negotiations at the Council. It is an objective of the Danish Government to finalise the negotiations on the proposal before the end of its presidency of the EU.
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