EU strengthens alliance with cities on climate change

Hundreds of city representatives have launched a new and integrated Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, less than two months ahead of the COP21 international summit in Paris.

Signatory cities have pledged action to support the implementation of the new 2030 EU targets, a joint approach to tackling mitigation and adaptation to climate change, and the extension of the initiative to a more global scope. Since 2009 some 6,500 local authorities have already committed to the 2020 CO₂ reduction objective.

Last summer, the European Commission launched a consultation process with the support of the European Committee of the Regions to collect cities’ views on the possible orientations of a new Covenant of Mayors. The response included a 97 percent call for a new target beyond 2020. The majority also endorsed the 2030 objectives for a minimum 40 percent CO₂ reduction, 27 percent increase in energy efficiency and renewables, and support for the integration of mitigation and adaptation to climate change under a common umbrella.

“The response to climate urgency can also become an opportunity for local development, job creation and the emergence of a new societal model,” said Johanna Rolland, Mayor of Nantes, whose city plans to reduce emissions by 50 percent by 2030.

Daniël Termont, Mayor of Ghent, shared the ambitious political objective to become “a climate-proof city by 2030, prepared for precipitation extremes, droughts, heat-stress and sea level rise.”

Patrick Klugman, Deputy Mayor of Paris, representing the COP21 host city, also shared the city’s newly adopted climate adaptation roadmap that plans to create 100 hectares of green roofs by the end of the mayor’s political mandate. On the energy front, Paris is on course to power all municipal buildings with green electricity by 2016.

EU Commissioner for Energy and Climate Action, Miguel Arias Cañete, welcomed this “bottom up approach which has worked so well in Europe”. He emphasised the Covenant of Mayors as already the “world’s biggest urban climate and energy initiative” and a European success story to be exported on the road to Paris.

Echoing the Commissioner’s remarks, Eckart Würzner, Mayor of Heidelberg, later pointed out that with over 200 million citizens represented through local council commitments, the Covenant of Mayors voice could not be ignored ahead and beyond COP21.

In the context of this new global dimension, the Covenant of Mayors has also become an official data provider of NAZCA, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) platform which showcases the commitments of non-state actors on the way to COP21.