During the EP plenary session (15-18 January 2018) in Strasbourg, MEPs debate on energy efficiency, renewables and the governance of the Energy Union. José BLANCO LÓPEZ (S&D, ES), Claude TURMES (Greens/EFA, LU), Michèle RIVASI (Greens/EFA, FR), and Miroslav POCHE (S&D, CS), rapporteurs, express themselves in the Chamber. Illustrative footage: photovoltaic energy, wind energy and methane biogas energy.

Strasbourg

plenary session

energy efficiency (T)

renewable energy (T)

energy union (T)

joint debate

BLANCO LÓPEZ, José (S&D, ES)

TURMES, Claude (Greens/EFA, LU)

RIVASI, Michèle (Greens/EFA, FR)

POCHE, Miroslav (S&D, CZ)

solar energy

biomass

wind energy

Clean energy: extracts from the joint debate and illustrative footage

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), Jos&#233; BLANCO L&#211;PEZ (S&amp;D, ES), rapporteur, In fact after the climate change negationist Donald Trump was elected President Paris agreement is even more important than before . We need now then to do something very clear. The Commission didn&rsquo;t go far enough it lacked ambition and Council has decided to sit on his hands if not even move backwards. Europe can&rsquo;t simply make fine speeches, sounding declarations, without any real building commitment if it's serious about tackling Climate change.

SOUNDBITE (Czech), Miroslav POCHE (S&amp;D, CZ), rapporteur, Energy savings is also an integral part of the strategy aiming at long-term energy security of Europe . It has been proven that every percent of energy efficiency improvement will bring a much higher decrease of our import dependence. When it comes to natural gas it&rsquo;s one or two percent reduction of the import volume. Only if our target is ambitious we will preserve the current rate of import dependence.

SOUNDBITE (French), Mich&#232;le RIVASI (Greens/EFA, FR), rapporteur, We have introduced the idea that the Commission should have a complete strategy from methane. That has a strong potential to heat the planet and the five years a tonne of methane is just as dangerous as a hundred tons of CO2 so that&rsquo;s important.

SOUNDBITE (German), Claude TURMES (Greens/EFA, LU), So the context is important, in the renewables report the national binding goals are set down. I as the renewables rapporteur always defended simple un-bureaucratic way of making governments do things nationally. If we give that up then when it comes to governance we&rsquo;re going to have to spell out in greater details what it means. If we want 35 % of renewables goal at EU level how do we achieve that within such a straitjacket?

SOUNDBITE (Spanish), Miguel ARIAS CA&#209;ETE, Member of the EC in charge of Climate Action and Energy, It is clear that strong governance rules will be a corner stone for insuring a resilient Union with ambitious climate energy and climate policies, and for making sure that the whole plenary package sticks together. We also need to promote additional efforts to tackle energy poverty in Europe. The climate energy package propose several measures which are contributing to the alleviation and fighting energy poverty. I welcome that the EP has recognised the importance of this by strengthening the efforts to be put in place by member states to reduce energy poverty.

Illustrative footage: photovoltaic energy; wind energy and methane biogas energy (10 shots) .