After the EU Parliament voted in favor of calling investments in certain nuclear power plants and gas infrastructure sustainable, Austria now wants to sue.
328 to 278, with 33 abstentions, and 66 MEPs who did not press a voting button: The European Parliament voted on Wednesday against rejecting the European Commission’s proposal to label certain future investments in nuclear power and natural gas as sustainable. Thus, the last realistic possibility to prevent this part of the EU taxonomy regulation has failed. Austria’s Environment Minister, Leonore Gewessler (Greens), and her Luxembourg counterpart, Claude Turmes, have announced that they intend to take legal action before the EU Court of Justice. However, how successful this will be remains to be seen, and the process may take years.
This legal text determines the extent to which various forms of investment may be advertised as sustainable. This is of great importance in light of the enormous amounts that have to be used by private investors to finance the energy transition. “In the short term, I don’t think it will have much of an impact,” said Dutch Social Democrat Paul Tang, who voted against the eco-label for nuclear power and gas. “But my big concern is that it will undermine the credibility of the taxonomy.”