Turmes, who is responsible for guiding the proposal through Parliament, said while much progress had been made in 'trialogue' negotiations between the European Commission, Parliament and the French Presidency, Paris was "refusing to engage in meaningful negotiation" of the main outstanding issues.
These include a safeguard mechanism for the European transport sector and a revision clause for 2014, according to Turmes.
The Union is aiming to achieve a 20% share of renewables in the EU's energy mix by 2020 (see EurActiv LinksDossier). But one of the most controversial French ideas is a proposal to review efforts torward the 20% target in 2014. The Parliament is vigorously opposed to this amid concerns that it would undermine investor certainty in the sector. MEPs are also worried that a proposal on flexibility, whereby member states could count investment in renewable energy production in other countries towards their own targets, would create a virtual market for greener energy certificates instead of encouraging physical cross-border trade.
Commenting on the review clause, the European Renewable Energy Council (EREC) said that to ensure investment in renewables, a stable and predictable framework would be needed over the next twelve years, with a revision in 2014 increasing the investment risk factor.
"If the target is to be achieved in the most cost-efficient way, then investor confidence must be secured. We know that many private investors around the globe are waiting for this directive to be adopted in order to start investing the hundreds of billions of euro that are needed to make Europe more energy-independent, competitive and sustainable," the EREC said.
Biofuels
Meanwhile, a consensus on biofuel sustainability criteria seemed to be emerging in talks on Wednesday (26 November), as MEPs and EU governments set out to incorporate the impact of indirect land-use changes into the new renewables directive. This would mean that calculations of greenhouse gas savings from the use of biofuels will in future have to take into account factors such as the indirect increase of CO2 output caused by deforestation and higher food prices resulting from land shift from food to biofuel production.
But there was no agreement on when to factor these into the calculations. MEPs want to see indirect land-use change included immediately in the formula proposed for calculating biofuel emissions, while member states would rather wait for the Commission's quantification proposals in 2010, which would delay the introduction of the law substantially, ENDS Europe reported.
Oliver Schäfer, policy director at the EREC, said a "visible" understanding was emerging that the effects of land use must be taken into consideration. "This is the right way to go," he said, before adding that it would still take at least one or two years for the scientific methodology to quantify this to be made available.
