The European Union must slash greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by 2040, Brussels said on Tuesday in a recommendation aimed at ensuring climate neutrality becomes a reality by mid-century.
The 90% reduction, as compared to 1990s levels, would entail a massive deployment of renewable systems, the irreversible abolition of coal, and the near-total disappearance of gas from the bloc's energy system, as well as profound changes in transport, food, buildings, factories and waste management.
The target is necessary to keep the EU aligned with the 2015 Paris Agreement, which committed nations to keep the Earth's long-term average temperature well below 2°C and, preferably, below 1.5°C, a goal that each year appears to slip further away.
The sense of urgency dramatically ratcheted up when 2023 was declared the warmest year since records began in 1850, laying bare the ticking bomb set by the climate crisis.
