By Kate Abnett

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BRUSSELS, Sept 9 (Reuters) – European Union countries are split over how ambitious to make their new climate change target, putting into doubt plans to strike a deal next week, their latest compromise proposal showed on Tuesday.

EU countries are negotiating a legally binding 2040 climate change target, which their ministers had planned to approve at a summit on September 18 – a move designed to reaffirm the EU’s commitment to fight climate change ahead of this year’s U.N. COP30 global climate negotiations.

However, countries including France, Poland and the Czech Republic want to delay the deal and escalate the talks to government leaders.

Climate change has made Europe the world’s fastest-warming continent, unleashing deadly heat and fires, but the target has stoked political tensions over how much the EU should invest in tackling global warming, as governments also try to increase defence spending and support struggling industries.

Member countries’ latest compromise proposal showed governments are split over how much of the emissions target can be met by buying foreign carbon credits – which would soften the efforts required by domestic European industries.

“The level, timing and conditions of the contribution of international carbon credits to the 2040 target, require political discussion,” said the document, dated September 9 and seen by Reuters. EU countries’ ambassadors will discuss it on Friday.

The overall target would be to cut net EU greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by 2040, from 1990 levels – with a share of this covered by buying foreign carbon credits.

The Commission had proposed that countries buy credits to cover 3% of the 2040 emissions target, starting from 2036. Those numbers are now in brackets in the compromise proposal, indicating countries do not agree on them.

The document was drafted by Denmark, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency. A spokesperson for Denmark’s EU presidency said it had held talks with every EU country before drafting the compromise – and was still working to reach a deal next week.

Failure to strike a deal next week could mean the EU misses a mid-September deadline to submit new climate plans to the U.N., for the global COP climate summit in November.

Other changes to the proposal would give countries more assurances that the EU will assess the impact of future green policies on industries when designing them, the draft showed.

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Kate Abnett covers EU climate and energy policy in Brussels, reporting on Europe’s green transition and how climate change is affecting people and ecosystems across the EU. Other areas of coverage include international climate diplomacy. Before joining Reuters, Kate covered emissions and energy markets for Argus Media in London. She is part of the teams whose reporting on Europe’s energy crisis won two Reuters journalist of the year awards in 2022.

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