European Union leaders announced they will be consolidating energy and environmental goals under a new commissioner, effectively axing the intergovernmental groups’ climate arm as green policies are making it harder for citizens to pay their power bills.
Former Spanish agriculture and environment minister Miguel Arias Canete was tapped by the EU Commission to take over a consolidated energy and climate office. Canete will be replacing Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard and Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger in what is seen as a huge blow to Europe’s global warming efforts.
“The EU is signalling a historical shift away from its green priority towards a new focus on economic recovery, competitiveness and energy cost,” Dr. Benny Peiser, director of the Global Warming Policy Forum, told The Daily Caller News Foundation.
“This policy shift has been in the making for the last two years, but only now has Europe new leaders who are no longer obsessed with climate change,” said Peiser, who is based in the UK.
The change in EU energy and climate leadership was partly spurred by Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, which has put Europe’s natural gas supplies at risk. The Ukraine crisis also sparked calls for Europe to drill for its oil and gas using hydraulic fracturing and begin importing more energy from allies, like the U.S.
