Poland’s centre-left coalition government led by Prime Minister Donald Tusk said it was opposed to the newly proposed European Union target for cutting emissions.
Government spokesman Adam Szłapka called it “unrealistic and unacceptable”.
On July 2, the European Commission unveiled a proposal to amend EU climate legislation to include a 2040 target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 90 per cent of their level in 1990.
The current EU target was for a 55 per cent cut by 2030 and to achieve net-zero by 2050.
On July 3, climate minister Paulina Henning-Kloska told commercial broadcaster Polsat News: “Poland will not support the climate goal for 2040 as proposed by the European Commission because our country is not yet ready to implement such ambitious plans.”
She did, though, emphasise that the government supported having “more renewables in the energy mix” but added “eliminating emissions is not only about energy, it is also about transport, industry, agriculture”.
The climate minister said she hoped for “greater flexibility” to be shown by Brussels.
“The EU’s reduction target must be realistic, and the contributions of individual countries toward achieving it must be varied,” Henning-Kloska said.
To make any changes to the EC proposal, Poland would need to build a coalition of countries to block or lower the proposed target.
One such potential ally may be France, where President Emmanuel Macron recently said he was in favour of delaying discussions over the 2040 targets.
The current proposal already included elements to soften the impact for countries such as Poland, including “international credits” granted to planting trees or protecting forests elsewhere in order to shift some decarbonisation away from the domestic sectors.
Hennig-Kloska said Poland regarded the credit system as a “useful tool” but expressed doubt that it would be enough to win over the support of reluctant member states.
Analysts pointed out that the proposed measures would cover on 3 per cent of the intended cut in emissions.
Poland is still highly reliant on coal for its electricity production with that accounting for 57 per cent of its electricity production in 2024.
The country has, though, ramped up its renewable energy programme with that now accounting for nearly 30 per cent of its energy mix in 2024, up from less than 10 per cent in 2015.
Poland’s opposition Conservatives (PiS) party was also critical of the new EU emissions target. European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) MEP Michał Dworczyk, of the PiS, stated it would “result in unimaginable costs” that would have to be met by ordinary Poles.
Dworczyk, who served in the previous PiS government led by ECR head Mateusz Morawiecki, was also critical of the Tusk government.
He accused the administration of misleading voters during the recent presidential campaign when it claimed that the EU Green Deal was dead in the water and therefore not an issue for Poland.
