Letter to the European Commission – Gas and Ukraine
15. März 2022
Brussels, 15 March 2022
Dear President von der Leyen,
Dear Commissioner McGuinness,
While the number of Ukrainian civilians who are displaced, injured or worse, reaches millions, the European Union continues to send money to Russia for the provision of gas. Our dependency on Russian gas funds Putin’s war and enables the attacks on the Ukrainian people, its historic cities and the principle of sovereign self-determination that we hold dear.
Your Commission, Member States and this Parliament are clear. We welcome your plan to make Europe independent from Russian fossil fuels. This stands in stark contrast with the proposal to incentivise investments in fossil gas through the Taxonomy Regulation which was decided by your Commission before the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We should transition away from fossil gas, and avoid the increase in its use through the construction of new gas plants. This Delegated Act does the exact opposite.
We were therefore surprised to see that in your REPowerEU plan, this Delegated Act was left untouched. Withdrawing the Delegated Act will increase the focus of investments on truly sustainable energy sources and thereby increase our energy independency. Maintaining the Delegated Act, on the other hand, will only further increase our dependency on gas and our reliance on Russian imports. This would undermine the effectiveness of the REPowerEU plan which we need to succeed.
There is a clear need to end our reliance on Russian gas and transition to renewable sources. Therefore, we demand the Commission to withdraw the Complementary Delegated Act.
Yours sincerely,
Francois Alfonsi
Rasmus Andresen
Eric Andrieu
Marc Angel
Maria Arena
Margrete Auken
Alica Bah Kuhnke
Pernando Barrena
Robert Biedron
Benoit Biteau
Malin Björk
Michael Bloss
Manuel Bompard
Simona Bonafé
Patrick Breyer
Delara Burkhardt
Reinhard Butikofer
Damien Careme
Anna Cavazzini
Mohammed Chahim
Antoni Comin I Oliveres
David Cormand
Ignazio Corrao
Ciaran Cuffe
Jakob Dalunde
Rosa D’Amato
Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield
Karima Delli
Anna Deparnay-Grunenberg
Pascal Durand
Lucia Ďuriš Nicholsonová
Bas Eickhout
Evi Eleonora
Cornelia Ernst
Niels Fuglsang
Malte Gallee
Alexandra Geese
Dino Giarrusso
Raphaël Glucksmann
Claude Gruffat
Sylvie Guillaume
José Gusmão
Jytte Guteland
Henrike Hahn
Christophe Hansen
Martin Hausling
Anja Hazekamp
Martin Hojsik
Pär Holmgren
Yannick Jadot
Agnes Jongerius
Petros Kokkalis
Miapetra Kumpula-Natri
Aurore Lalucq
Philippe Lamberts
César Luena
Chris Macmanus
Fabio Massima Castaldo
Marisa Matias
Liudas Mazylis
Nora Mebarek
Silvia Modig
Niklas Nienass
Ville Niinisto
Grace O’Sullivan
Jutta Paulus
Mikuláš Peksa
Kira Marie Peter-Hansen
Larrouturou Pierre
Sirpa Pietikäinen
Evelyn Regner
Terry Reintke
René Repasi
Thijs Reuten
Michele Rivasi
Caroline Roose
Mounir Satouri
Christel Schaldemose
Andreas Schieder
Guenther Sidl
Michal Šimečka
Linea Sogaard-Lidell
Jordi Solé
Tineke Strik
Paul Tang
Vera Tax
Marie Toussaint
Ernest Urtasun
Kathleen van Brempt
Kim van Sparrentak
Nikolaj Villumsen
Marianne Vind
Bettina Vollath
Thomas Waitz
Mick Wallace
Sarah Wiener
Michal Wiezik
Emma Wiesner
Isabel Wiseler-Lima
Tiemo Woelken
Lara Wolters