It's crunch time for Europe to lead the way and bring big climate players on side, but will they have the muscle to do so? MEP Giovanni La Via gives us his predictions.

Lima Climate Conference: can Europe chart the global course?

https://api.multimedia.europarl.europa.eu/documents/20125/11903637/n003-0323-en.srt

You're about to leave for  an important climate conference in Lima,

something of a rehearsal  for the big conference next year in Paris.

What message and what aims will the  European Parliament be taking to Lima?

The EU has always led the fight  against climate change

We've moved forward  on our own until recently,

but now we see other big global players,

big countries with an important role  in terms of pollution, wanting to join us.

So we can move together  towards a global agreement.

You're referring to the agreement  last week between China and the USA

What should the EU's  negotiating strategy be

and chart a path leading  to the signing of the Paris agreement.

So at Lima we'll look  at the thresholds for energy saving,

the thresholds  for reducing greenhouse gases,

the targets we want to set ourselves  for renewable energy

and with these in mind  we'll need to decide together

which countries  should adopt binding targets

towards energy efficiency,  reduction of emissions

and we'll begin to see that conditions  are right for moving forward.

One target which won't become binding  but will still affect us as a community

is energy efficiency,  reduction in energy consumption.

A lot of small businesses  have developed as a result of this.

Do you think  that making this aspect non-binding

will force countries to reduce  public funding for these businesses,

affecting the development  of this green economy?

the real binding target,  the most ambitious one.

If we managed to reduce consumption  through energy efficiency,

we could actually achieve,  as a result,

further reductions  in greenhouse gas emissions,

further reductions  in overall energy consumption

and, following this,  positive effects on the environment.

We saw in Copenhagen that developing  countries like Brazil and India

What strategy should Europe adopt  regarding these countries?

These countries want to maintain  a competitive differential with us.

We can agree to uphold  a prearranged differential and say,

but you mustn't stop,  you must keep pace with us.

If we do 10, 15, 20 percent more,  you must do your initial 15 or 20 percent.

Since it's easier to achieve  good results in the initial phase,

they can do this without much effort and  we can aim for a more ambitious target.

Parliament still needs to evaluate it  but it's work in progress.

Do you think the targets in this package

and we've essentially reached  the targets that we set,

so we've already shown  that we can progress along this path.

So why are we holding back  those who are asking for more?

We've said, in discussions  with the other EU institutions,

that if other countries  adopted targets in line with ours,

we could make these targets  binding for individual countries.

But if firm commitments aren't made  by all the countries at Paris,

yet more onerous targets  are given to our Member States

will mean reducing the competitiveness  of our economic system

and not tackling the issues  of economic relaunch

as the effect on the competitiveness  of their system

could risk destroying the economic system.

So if we manage to achieve  a global agreement in Paris,

there could be an internal review  of the climate package.

You say you wouldn't be against imposing  national limits again in the future?

Of course we will be discussing this  package in the coming months and years.

In relation to what we see in Lima  and our negotiations for Paris,

we will be able to adjust our targets  through legislation,

making them more binding and stringent  than the Commission's proposals.