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PA

EU reaches deal to reduce methane gas emissions from energy sector

Methane emissions are one of the biggest drivers of climate change.

EUROPEAN UNION NEGOTIATORS have reached a deal to reduce highly polluting methane gas emissions from the energy sector across the bloc.

According to experts, one of the biggest drivers of climate change is methane gas emissions – second only to carbon dioxide. The gas also causes serious health problems.

Most emissions come from the energy, agriculture and waste sectors.

Under the provisional agreement announced just weeks before the COP28 climate conference, the fossil gas, oil and coal industry will be forced to “properly measure, monitor, report and verify their methane emissions according to the highest monitoring standards, and take action to reduce them”, said the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm.

The deal needs to be formally approved by both the European Parliament and the Council, which represents member states, before the new legislation comes into force.

This came as China and the United States pledged to accelerate their efforts to address climate change ahead of a major United Nations meeting on the issue, making a commitment to take steps to reduce emissions of methane and other greenhouse gases besides carbon dioxide.

The US, the EU and other nations have previously committed to reduce overall methane emissions worldwide by 30% by 2030.

The Commission said the compromise requires operators to report about quantification and measurements of methane emissions at source level, and forces oil and gas companies to detect and repair methane leaks on EU soil.

It also bans routine venting and flaring, which release methane in the atmosphere, and limits venting from thermal coal mines from 2027, with stricter conditions introduced after 2031.

“It requires companies in the oil, gas and coal sectors to carry out an inventory of closed, inactive, plugged and abandoned assets, such as wells and mines, to monitor their emissions and to adopt a plan to mitigate these emissions as soon as possible,” the Commission added.

The EU Methane Regulation for the energy sector is part of the so-called European Green Deal that seeks to establish the world’s most ambitious climate and biodiversity targets.

Since the EU imports large quantities of oil, gas and coal, the deal also requires from 2027 that new import contracts can only be sealed “if the same monitoring, reporting and verification obligations are applied by exporters as for EU producers”, the Commission said.

This work is co-funded by Journal Media and a grant programme from the European Parliament. Any opinions or conclusions expressed in this work are the author’s own. The European Parliament has no involvement in nor responsibility for the editorial content published by the project. For more information, see here.

 

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    Mute DeeM
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 7:57 AM

    How on earth can a student who is appealing a grade sit a leaving cert exam in November? They haven’t been in school since March. They may or may not have had online teaching support in subsequent months and they will have missed their opportunity to go to college because the results are being given too close to the CAO offers, the appeals date and the start of the college year. A deliberate ploy on the part of the Department of Education to try to discourage students from appealing. The whole thing is an absolute shambles!! Good luck to the leaving cert students of 2020..I hope every single one of them that wants to go to college, gets a place in the course of their choice.

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    Mute Bikes rule the world
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 12:51 PM

    @DeeM: they could self study, their education didn’t stop just because of the pandemic

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    Mute Daff. Myers
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 9:47 PM

    @Bikes rule the world: no, it did. It stopped. That’s actually exactly what happened.

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    Mute
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    Sep 5th 2020, 12:50 AM

    @Bikes rule the world:
    self study yes. but we had to return our books back in may. so we don’t even have those as resources + no teacher contact.

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    Mute Alan Wilson
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 9:03 AM

    I think the reason they moved the result date was that there was no time before the start of Uni to question the results

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    Mute Molly1952
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 9:23 AM

    @Alan Wilson: If you question your results and are awarded a higher grade you will get the place you are entitled to in college, as far as I know. I just don’t know what the perfect solution to this year’s LC would have been. All the partners in education were involved in the decision to do it this way and still people are up in arms. What would the hurlers on the ditch have done better, I wonder? There was no manual for handling something as unprecedented as this pandemic.

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    Mute Canyon
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 9:10 AM

    Here’s how it will work…..anyone who doesn’t get their No 1 choice will moan about the unfairness of it all. Simples.

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    Mute sean o'dhubhghaill
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 1:03 PM

    @Canyon: That’s not the a problem with the LC, that’s a problem with the CAO.

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    Mute Conall
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    Sep 3rd 2020, 1:51 PM

    Barristers and solicitors are already clearing their calendars for late September and early October. I expect there are going to be an enormous number of cases. Previously results were based on single exams that everyone sat – the human element for grading was to a large extent objective. Now it’s to a large extent subjective.

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