European Union Methane Action Plan

Country / jurisdiction: European Union · Year: 2022 · Status: In force · Level: National · Type: Voluntary

Submitted to the Climate & Clean Air Coalition (CCAC), the EU's Methane Action Plan outlines policies and activities that will support the Global Methane Pledge (GMP) to reduce global emissions by 30% by 2030. The EU's long-term policy goal is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions towards climate neutrality by 2050.

Section 1 of the Plan describes the sources and trends in EU's methane emissions. Data in this section comes from EU greenhouse gas inventories. The agriculture sector represents 54% of methane emissions — the largest source of methane emissions in the EU. Emissions in this sector have been reduced by 21% compared to 1990 levels. The energy sector has the smallest contribution of 17% of methane emissions in the EU due to mitigation efforts in the fuel industry contributing a 60% reduction. The waste management sector is also mentioned, representing 27% of methane emissions and a 37% reduction.

Section 2 it describes existing EU policies that have contributed to reduction, a review of these policies and additional policies to achieve higher methane emission reductions. Existing policies include:

European Climate Law;

EU Emissions Trading System;

Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry Regulation;

Effort Sharing Regulation; and

EU Methane Strategy

The Plan lists the following policies specific to each sector:

Agriculture The new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the period 2023-2027

Farm to Fork Strategy

Waste Management  Waste Framework Directive

Landfill Directive

Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive

Sewage Sludge Directive

Energy Sector Legislative proposal to reduce methane emissions in the energy sector

Revision proposal for the Energy Efficiency Directive

Revision proposal for the Renewable Energy Directive

Section 3 describes the impact of increased climate ambition, which has historically been reduced steadily since 1990 — 36% in total.

Section 4 describes how the EU intends to Monitor and Report on its progress on reducing methane emissions, as well as on the policies and measures that directly impact sectoral methane emissions.

Official source: https://www.ccacoalition.org/en/file/8990/download?token=uyex6sbg