Europe's Green Week Focus on Behavior Change

BRUSSELS, Belgium, May 31, 2004 (ENS) - Brussels and Bonn will be the focus of major environmental debates during the first week of June. The European Commission's latest annual Green Week will unfold in the European Union capital, while Germany will host four days of discussions in Bonn on boosting renewable energies worldwide.

The Commission's objective during Green Week is to encourage people to "think aloud" about how citizens, businesses, policy makers, nongovernmental organizations, authorities, teachers, scientists and young people can really change their environmental behavior.

Green Week in Brussels will involve a series of seminars and workshops ranging across topical European environmental issues. Also expected are numerous side events, report launches and press conferences by stakeholder organizations.

Emissions-free transportation in England (Photos courtesy FreeFoto)

Green Week conference sessions will focus on how citizens can be involved more in environmental policy making.

On Tuesday evening the latest European business awards for the environment will be presented. The event will herald a series of other business focused debates.

On Wednesday, the annual Green Week conference will discuss the relationship between environmmental policies and economic growth, with sessions on ecobusiness, green branding and advertising, and environmental technologies.

Sessions on Thursday will celebrate the 25th anniversary of the EU's pioneering 1979 directive on protecting wild bird species. Friday will be dedicated to discussions on Europe's seas and oceans.

Representatives of governments from around the world will gather in Bonn from Tuesday to Friday for "Renewables 2004." Organized as a followup to the Johannesburg sustainability summit of 2002, the event is meant to boost the momentum of renewable energy growth.

Outcomes will include a political declaration, an international action program and guidelines on policies to support renewables. Debate will continue to focus on demands for regional and global targets for boosting renewables.

The European Commission will propose new long-term EU renewable energy targets in 2007, it said on Wednesday in a hotly disputed communication. Earlier drafts of the communication made no commitment at all to setting new targets.

Kirkheaton Wind Farm, Northumberland, England (Photo courtesy Freefoto)

In a second significant shift, the published communication emphasizes obstacles to renewable energy growth as the reason for not proposing 2020 targets immediately. Previously it blamed EU member states' failure to show they could reach existing 2010 targets.

Obstacles include "technical and practical limits" on renewables' cost-effective availability," it now says. A previously unmentioned staff working paper analyzing these "difficulties" is being released alongside the communication.

As a result of this analysis, the communication concludes, more thorough assessment is needed before deciding on EU targets beyond 2010. This will include an extended impact analysis, taking into account competitiveness, security of supply, technical feasibility and environmental aspects.

The assessement will be issued before November 2005 "in order to set in 2007 a target for the period after 2010."

The bulk of the communication evaluates progress across countries and technologies towards existing 2010 targets of a 12 percent share of renewable energy in the EU-15 countries and a 21 percent share of renewable electricity across the enlarged EU-25. As became clear last month, the Commission believes both will be missed.

In the run-up to Bonn, the German environment minister welcomed the Commission's pledge on setting new EU targets as a "pleasing and strong signal." Juergen Trittin noted the European Parliament's call for a European target of 20 percent renewable energy by 2020.

Europe's renewable energy industry is continuing to push for even more ambitious targets. On Thursday, the European Renewable Energy Council released scenarios showing that renewables could provide 50 percent of global energy supply by 2040.

In a related development, European biomass industry association Aebiom and the conservation group WWF issued a report concluding that industrialized countries could cut carbon dioxide emissions by one billion metric tons if they used biomass instead of coal to generate electricity.

An exhibition will be a centerpiece of Green Week, showcasing some 60 projects by environmental organizations and networks, businesses, consumer organizations, educational and research establishments, and EU, national, regional and local authorities.

This year, the exhibition will also feature a sustainable stock market. Visitors will be able to buy and sell stocks in sustainable and non-sustainable companies. The visitor that has the highest return at the end of the week will receive a prize. With this stock market simulation the Environment Directorate hopes to demonstrate "as is the case in real life," it says, that "sustainable stocks will give you as much – if not more – return on investment as non-sustainable stocks without any significant difference in terms of risk."

An Art Gallery will permanently display the 50 winning entries in the Green Week 2004 painting and photographs competitions. The theme of this year’s competition is “birds in their natural habitat,” organized to highlight the 25th anniversary of the EU Birds Directive.

To find out what Green Week events are happening across Europe, view a clickable map at: http://urbangreendays.org/index.php?id=1059

{Published in cooperation with ENDS Environment Daily, Europe's choice for environmental news. Environmental Data Services Ltd, London. Email: envdaily@ends.co.uk}