‘Please don’t betray us’: Ukrainians call on EU Parliament to reject green label for gas and nuclear

Ukrainian activists and politicians have urged the European Parliament to reject plans to label nuclear and gas as ‘green’ investments, saying this would be a “gift to Putin”.

Note: this article has been updated with quotes from the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany and further details about Russian-made nuclear power plants across EU countries. 

The inclusion of “gas and nuclear in the EU taxonomy is a very clear gift to Putin to feed his war machine against Ukrainians,” said Svitlana Romanko, an environmental lawyer and campaign leader at Stand With Ukraine, an activist group.

The proposal to include gas in the EU’s sustainable finance taxonomy risks increasing the EU’s dependency on Russian gas and could sabotage efforts to cut dependency on Russian fossil fuel imports, she added.

“MEPs have to veto the EU taxonomy delegated act because it violates the human rights of Ukrainians, which are still under huge abuse with the Russian war against Ukraine,” she told EURACTIV.

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany Andrij Melnyk wrote an open letter to German lawmakers, calling on them to reject the proposal.

“For Russia’s gas industry, the taxonomy would open up a ‘multitude of opportunities’, Russian Energy Minister Nikolai Shulginov happily declared,” reads the letter.

“On the other hand, LNG terminals in particular are not considered eligible. The terms of the taxonomy thus clearly favour Russian gas. Gazprom, Roasatom and Lukoil have apparently lobbied Brussels accordingly,” it continues.

Because the European Parliament cannot introduce amendments, “unfortunately your only option is to reject the existing delegated act. I remain hopeful of your support” he told lawmakers.

The European Commission proposed including nuclear energy and fossil gas in a list of green investments, called the EU sustainable finance taxonomy, earlier this year.

The proposal will be voted on in the European Parliament on 4-7 July. MEPs can reject the plan by an absolute majority – i.e. if more than half of its 705 members vote to do so.

There are concerns both in Ukraine and the European Parliament that the draft legislation could support the Kremlin’s war, which started after the proposal was tabled.

Since the invasion of Ukraine, the EU has sent over €62 billion to Russia in return for fossil fuels. Some European nuclear power plants, especially those in central and eastern Europe, are also heavily reliant on imports of nuclear fuel from Russia.

Climate concerns

The money the EU has sent to help Ukraine is “nothing” compared to the payments for Russian energy, said Ukrainian MP Inna Sovsun.

Speaking to EURACTIV, she criticised the European Commission’s proposal to include nuclear and gas in its green list of investments, both because of the climate impact of fossil gas and the potential support it could provide for Russia.

“With the world committing itself to fighting climate change, we have to be truthful to ourselves and to the scientific evidence, which of course recognises that gas is cleaner than coal, but it’s still not clean enough to continue investing into further gas explorations,” said Sovsun.

It is “lying” to include gas and nuclear in a green list of investments, Svitlana Krakowska, the head of the Ukrainian delegation to the IPCC, told EURACTIV.

“To say that gas and nuclear are sustainable is not acceptable, especially in this circumstance of war in Ukraine, where it’s pretty clear how gas and nuclear truly fund this war,” she added.

Money to Putin’s war chest

The war in Ukraine is obviously an energy war, with the Russian military underpinned by fossil fuel money, Romanko told EURACTIV.

A report by Greenpeace France found that Russia could earn an extra €4 billion a year from taxonomy-aligned fossil gas capacity expansion, with the inclusion of nuclear energy allowing Russian state-owned company Rosatom to strengthen commercial links with European clients.

Bulgaria, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, and Finland all have Russian-built nuclear power plants and have relied on Moscow for key supply and maintenance operations in the past. Since the outbreak of  war in Ukraine, some have now turned to sourcing nuclear fuel from US company Westinghouse.

But Moscow still has good relations with Hungary where state-owned Rosatom is building two VVER reactors. Last year, Russia gave Hungary a five-year delay on payments for the Russian-led expansion of the Paks nuclear power plant south of Budapest.

The report also found that Russian energy companies, like Gazprom, Lukoil and Rosatom, met with EU commissioners and senior officials either directly or via subsidiaries and lobby groups at least 18 times since the EU executive published its plan for the green investment list in 2018.

“Russians are doing a great deal of the lobbying because they want to make sure that they can continue to exert political influence on the European societies,” Sovsun told EURACTIV, saying that the Kremlin has worked for years to exert pressure on the European Union and EU countries, with gas as a core part of this.

“We’re seeing that Putin and his cronies are using gas as a geopolitical weapon and they want to continue to be able to do that,” she added. “We have to recognise that this is a threat not only to our planet, but it’s also a threat to political stability and democratic development in Europe, but globally as well.”

EU nuclear renaissance financed by US and Russia?

A fight has been taking place in Brussels for over a year, fought publicly in the media and behind the scenes. Should Brussels grant nuclear a green investment label?

A French-Eastern European coalition of nuclear power has been pushing for the …

Rejection of ‘green’ label up to MEPs

Although several EU countries are opposed to the inclusion of fossil gas and nuclear in the taxonomy, they are unlikely to have the numbers to vote it down.

Because of this, all eyes are on the European Parliament, which can block the proposal if more than half of its 705 members vote to do so. Lawmakers in the environment and economy committees took the first step towards this when they approved an objection earlier in June.

The objection will be voted on in during a European Parliament plenary session on 4-7 July.

“I’m cautiously hopeful, but I understand that it’s not a done deal and I understand that we need to continue our advocacy efforts so that Russians do not influence this decision,” said Sovsun.

A vote against the inclusion could be a “turning point”, both in history and for Ukraine “giving more hope for us as Ukrainians that this war can be stopped by defying Putin’s wishes,” said Romanko.

Meanwhile, Krakowska called the taxonomy vote “a test of Europe”. Addressing lawmakers, she said: “When you make any decision, any documents, just remember that people in Ukraine – and people all over the globe because we are speaking about climate change as well – we are suffering and just please don’t betray us.”

Parliament committees object to EU's 'green' label for gas, nuclear

Two European Parliament committees on Tuesday (14 June) backed an attempt to stop the EU labelling gas and nuclear energy as climate-friendly investments, setting the stage for a full Parliament vote that could reject the rules next month.

[Edited by Frédéric Simon]

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