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Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs

Environment and climate

Environment and climate policies on corporate social responsibility

EU environment policies aim to protect the environment and biodiversity, minimize risks to human health, and promote the transition to a circular economy. They are interlinked with the main aim of the European Green Deal: Striving to be the first climate-neutral continent.

Deforestation: The EU aims to protect and improve the health of existing forests, especially primary forests, while significantly increasing sustainable, biodiverse forest coverage worldwide.

Fit for 55 package - Climate: The Fit for 55 legislative proposals cover a wide range of policy areas including climate, energy, transport and taxation, setting out the ways in which the Commission will reach its updated 2030 greenhouse gas emissions net reduction target of 55% in real terms

Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM): is the EU’s landmark tool to put a fair price on the carbon emitted during the production of carbon intensive goods that are entering the EU, and to encourage cleaner industrial production in non-EU countries.

Ecodesign for Sustainable Products: The new regulation will improve EU products’ circularity, energy performance and other environmental sustainability aspects.

Green claims: New criteria to stop companies from making misleading claims about environmental merits of their products and services

Empowering consumers for the green transition: The proposal empowers consumers for the green transition through better protection against unfair commercial practices and better information. 

Business and biodiversity: The EU Business & Biodiversity Platform provides a unique forum for dialogue and policy interface to discuss the links between business and biodiversity at EU level

The Net-Zero Industry Act is an initiative stemming from the Green Deal Industrial Plan which aims to scale up the manufacturing of clean technologies in the EU. This means increasing the EU’s manufacturing capacity of technologies that support the clean energy transition and release extremely low, zero or negative greenhouse gas emissions when they operate.

The Environmental Liability Directive establishes a framework for environmental liability with regard to prevention and remedying environmental damage based on the “polluter pays” principle for own operations. It does not cover companies’ value chains.