The\u00a0European Union\u00a0agreed on a landmark green-finance regulation, advancing the bloc\u2019s push to embed environmental goals in standards for banks, money managers and insurers.<\/p>\n
EU lawmakers approved an accord on the\u00a0list of sustainable activities late Monday, following an agreement by the bloc\u2019s member states earlier in the day.\u00a0Policymaker<\/span>s had to overcome last-minute divisions over the kinds of technologies that should be eligible to be classified as green, with nuclear-energy proponents, including France, seeking revisions to an earlier version of the proposed rules.<\/p>\n \u201cWith this deal, we now have a common language and new rules for financial markets,\u201d Pascal Canfin, a French member of the EU parliament, said in an email. The final compromise means both nuclear and gas \u201care neither included nor excluded in principle\u201d from parts of the list, and — like all other activities — would feature only if they comply with the so-called \u201cdo no significant harm\u201d principle, he said.<\/p>\n The EU\u2019s definitions of sustainable activities for investment purposes, dubbed \u201ctaxonomy,\u201d are the centerpiece of its plan to regulate the fast-growing market of green finance, in the hope<\/span>\u00a0of directing trillions of euros to fund a radical overhaul of the region\u2019s economy. It\u2019s meant to define what\u2019s green and what\u2019s not, an effort that could find a range of uses and serve as an example for governments around the world.<\/p>\n The back-and-forth over the rules shows what kind of obstacles the EU has to overcome to meet its ambitious climate targets. Leaders last week agreed that\u00a0the bloc should achieve zero net emissions by 2050, paving the way for a flurry of legislation that\u2019s needed for the unprecedented clean-up of the economy.<\/p>\n The agreement on the taxonomy is a vital step is it\u2019s meant to help countries shoulder the cost of fighting global warming. \u201cThis is the much-needed enabler to get green investments to flow and help Europe reach climate neutrality by 2050,\u201d Valdis Dombrovskis, the European Commissioner in charge of financial-services policy, said on Twitter.<\/p>\n Monday\u2019s agreement on the green investment catalog is just the first step of the process, setting out the overall framework. The concrete list of activities will be drawn up based on recommendations by a panel of experts and adopted by the\u00a0European Commission, the EU\u2019s executive arm.<\/p>\n All financial products will need to make clear to which extent they comply with the new framework, though issuers can opt-out if they don\u2019t pursue any environmental goals. The first set of definitions will be applied from the end of 2021, with the rest following a year later.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are delighted that there is progress in the approval of the EU taxonomy,\u201d Nathan Fabian, chief responsible investment officer at Principles for Responsible Investment, said in an email. \u201cInvestors in Europe and around the world see the taxonomy as a major reform in investment practices and are keen to understand their obligations under the framework.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The\u00a0European Union\u00a0agreed on a landmark green-finance regulation, advancing the bloc\u2019s push to embed environmental goals in standards for banks, money managers and insurers. EU lawmakers approved an accord on the\u00a0list of sustainable…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4688,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[46,48,57,68,76,77,82,86,87,90,96,99,103,107,109,111,113,137,139,146,148,160,174,183,184,201,202,209,222,230,232,233,244,246,249,256,262,263,267,277,279,280,285,288],"class_list":["post-4680","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-aramco","tag-athens","tag-baroudi","tag-carbon","tag-climate","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-cyprus","tag-decarbonising","tag-democracy","tag-doha","tag-eastmed","tag-egypt","tag-embargo","tag-emissions","tag-energy","tag-energy-peace","tag-gas","tag-gazprom","tag-greece","tag-greenenergy","tag-international-maritime-disputes","tag-lebanon","tag-maritime-boundaries-east-mediterranean","tag-maritime-disputes","tag-offshore","tag-oil","tag-opec","tag-pollution","tag-poverty-alleviation","tag-putin","tag-qatar","tag-rosneft","tag-roudi","tag-russia","tag-saudi","tag-solar","tag-solar-power","tag-straddling-hydrocarbons-reserves","tag-total","tag-trump","tag-turkey","tag-unclos","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Green Investment<\/h3>\n