Activities of Claude GRUFFAT related to 2023/0085(COD)
Shadow opinions (1)
OPINION on the proposal for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on Substantiation and communication of explicit environmental claims (Green Claims Directive)
Amendments (20)
Amendment 28 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 21
Recital 21
(21) Climate-related claims have been shown to be particularly prone to being unclear and ambiguous and to mislead consumers. This relates notably to environmental claims that products or entities are “climate neutral”, “carbon neutral”, “100% CO2 compensated”, or will be “net-zero” by a given year, or similar. Such statements are often based on “offsetting” of greenhouse gas emissions through “carbon credits” generated outside the company’s value chain, for example from forestry or renewable energy projects. The methodologies underpinning offsets vary widely and are not always transparent, accurate, or consistent. This leads to significant risks of overestimations and double counting of avoided or reduced emissions, due to a lack of additionality, permanence, ambitious and dynamic crediting baselines that depart from business as usual, and accurate accounting. These factors result in offset credits of low environmental integrity and credibility that mislead consumers when they are relied upon in explicit environmental claims. Offsetting can also deter traders from emissions reductions in their own operations and value chains. In order to adequately contribute to global climate change mitigation targets, traders should prioritise effective reductions of emissions across their own operations and value chains instead of relying on offsets. Any resulting residual emissions will vary by sector-specific pathway in line with the global climate targets and will have to be addressed through removals enhancements. When offsets are used nonetheless, it is deemed appropriate to address climate- related claims, including claims on futuIt is therefore particularly important to prohibit claims based on gre environmental performance, based house gas emissions offsets in a transparent manner. Therefore, the substantiation of climate- related claims should consider any greenhouse gas emissions offsets used by the traders separately from the trader’s or the product’s greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, this information should also specify the share of total emissions that are addressed through offsetting, whether these offsets relate to emission reductions or removals enhancement, and the methodology applied. The climate-related claims that include the use of offsets have to be substantiated by methodologies that ensure the integrity and correct accounting of these offsets and thus reflect coherently and transparently the resulting impact on the climateting that a product, either a good or service, has a neutral, reduced, or positive impact on the environment in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. Such claims should be prohibited under all circumstances as they mislead consumers into believing that such claims relate to the product itself or the supply and production of that product, or give consumers the false impression that the consumption of that product has no environmental impact when this is not the case. Examples of such claims include ‘climate neutral’, ‘CO2 neutral certified’, ‘carbon positive’, ‘climate net zero’, ‘climate compensated’, ‘reduced climate impact’, ‘limited CO2 footprint’, among others.
Amendment 38 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 31
Recital 31
(31) In order to meet both the needs of traders regarding dynamic marketing strategies and the needs of consumers regarding more detailed, and more accurate, environmental information, the Commission mayshould adopt delegated acts to supplement the provisions on substantiation of explicit environmental claims by further specifying the criteria for such substantiation with regard to certain claims (e.g. climate-related claims, including claims about offsets, “climate neutrality” or similar, recyclability and recycled content). The Commission should be empowered to further establish rules for measuring and calculating the environmental impacts, environmental aspects and environmental performance, by determining which activities, processes, materials, emissions or use of a product or trader contribute significantly or cannot contribute to the relevant environmental impacts and environmental aspects; by determining for which environmental aspects and environmental impacts primary information should be used; and by determining the criteria to assess the accuracy of primary and secondary information. While in most cases the Commission would consider the need for adopting these rules only after having the results of the monitoring of the evolution of environmental claims on the Union market, for some types of claims it may be necessary for the Commission to adopt supplementary rules before the results of this monitoring are available. For example, in case of climate-related claims it may be necessary to adopt such supplementary acts in order to operationalise the provisions on substantiation of claims based on offsets.
Amendment 39 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 32
Recital 32
(32) The Commission Recommendation (EU) 2021/2279 contains guidance on how to measure the life cycle environmental performance of specific products or organisations and how to develop Product Environmental Footprint Category Rules (PEFCRs) and Organisation Environmental Footprint Sectorial Rules (OEFSRs) that allow comparison of products to a benchmark. Such category rules for specific products or traders can be used to support the substantiation of claims in line with the requirements of this Directive. Therefore, the Commission should be empowered to adopt delegated acts to establish product group or sector specific rules where this may have added value. However, in case the Product Environmental Footprint method does not yet cover an impact category, which is relevant for a product group, the adoption of PEFCR may take place only once these new relevant environmental impact categories have been added. For example, as regards marine fisheries, the PEFCR should for example reflect the fisheries- specific environmental impact categories, in particular the sustainability of the targeted stock. Concerning space, the PEFCR should reflect defence and space- specific environmental impact categories, including the orbital space use. As regards food and agricultural products, biodiversity and nature protection, as well as farming practices, including positive externalities of extensive farming and animal welfare, should, for example, also be integrated before the adoption of PEFCR could be considered. The negative externalities of intensive farming including the use of synthetic pesticides and synthetic fertilisers should be integrated before the adoption of PEFCR. As regards textiles, the PEFCR should for example reflect the microplastics release, before the adoption of PEFCR could be considered.
Amendment 62 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 1 – title
Article 1 – title
Subject matter and Scope
Amendment 63 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 1 – paragraph -1 (new)
Article 1 – paragraph -1 (new)
-1. The purpose of this Directive is to provide for a high level of consumer and environmental protection by approximating the laws, regulations and administrative provisions of the Member States related to environmental claims made on or with reference to products made available on the market or to traders making available products on the market.
Amendment 76 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 2
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 2
(2) ‘explicit environmental claim’ means an environmental claim that is in textual form, or symbolic form, or contained in an environmental label;
Amendment 82 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 8
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 8
(8) ‘environmental label’ means a sustainability label covering only or predominantly or significant environmental aspects of a product, a process or a trader;
Amendment 95 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point d
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point d
(d) wWhere a claim is made on environmental performance, take into account all environmental aspects or environmental positive or negative impacts which are significant to assessing the environmental performance;
Amendment 105 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point h
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point h
(h) strictly and clearly separate any greenhouse gas emissions offsets used from greenhouse gas emissions as additional environmental information, specify whether those offsets relate to emission reductions or removals, and describe how the offsets relied upon are of the highest integrity, additional and permanent, and accounted for correctly to reflect the claimed impact on climate; only offsetting of greenhouse gas emissions through carbon credits generated inside the company’s value chain shall be taken into account;
Amendment 111 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 3 – paragraph 4 – introductory part
Article 3 – paragraph 4 – introductory part
4. When the regular monitoring of the evolution of environmental claims referred to in Article 20 reveals differences in the application of the requirements laid down in paragraph 1 for specific claims and such differences create obstacles for the functioning of the internal market, or where the Commission identifies that the absence of requirements for specific claims leads to widespread misleading of consumers, the Commission mayshall adopt delegated acts in accordance with Article 18 to supplement the requirements for substantiation of explicit environmental claims laid down in paragraph 1 by:
Amendment 121 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 a (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 a (new)
2a. Claims, based on greenhouse gas emissions offsetting, that a product has a neutral, reduced or positive impact on the environment in terms of greenhouse gas emissions shall not be made.
Amendment 122 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 b (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 b (new)
2b. Claims shall not be made on positive environmental impacts, aspects or performance the achievement of which has led or will lead to significant negative increase of any other environmental impact or aspect, in particular related to climate change, resource consumption and circularity, sustainable use and protection of water and marine resources, pollution, biodiversity and ecosystems.
Amendment 123 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 c (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 c (new)
2c. Claims shall not be made on positive environmental impacts, aspects or performance the achievement of which has led or will lead to a significant negative increase of the same environmental impact or aspect in another lifecycle stage of the product or part of the trader.
Amendment 124 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 d (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 d (new)
Amendment 125 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 e (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 e (new)
2e. Claims shall not be made for a product when synthetic fertiliser has been used.
Amendment 126 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 4 – paragraph 2 f (new)
Article 4 – paragraph 2 f (new)
2f. Where the products contain substances meeting the criteria for the hazard classes laid down in Annex I to Regulation (EC) 1272/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council110c, whether on their own, in mixtures or in an article, such products are not eligible for environmental claims. __________________ 110c Regulation (EC) No 1272/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2008 on classification, labelling and packaging of substances and mixtures, amending and repealing Directives 67/548/EEC and 1999/45/EC, and amending Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006
Amendment 133 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 5 – paragraph 5
Article 5 – paragraph 5
5. Explicit environmental claims on the cumulative environmental impacts of a product or trader based on an aggregated indicator of environmental impacts can be made only owhen the basis of rules to calculate such aggregated indicator that are established in the Union lawy are based on environmental labels complying with Article 7.
Amendment 138 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 5 – paragraph 6 – subparagraph 2 – point f
Article 5 – paragraph 6 – subparagraph 2 – point f
(f) for climate-related explicit environmental claims that rely on greenhouse gas emission offsets inside the company’s value chain, information to which extent they rely on these limited offsets and whether these relate to emissions reductions or removals;
Amendment 142 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 7 – paragraph 2
Article 7 – paragraph 2
2. Only environmental labels awarded under environmental labelling schemes established under Union lawadopting a scientific and reproducible method, performed by independent organisations complying with the requirements of paragraph 1 of this Article may present a rating or score of a product or trader based on an aggregated indicator of environmental impacts of a product or trader.
Amendment 144 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 8 – paragraph 2 – point d
Article 8 – paragraph 2 – point d
(d) the requirements for the environmental labelling scheme have been developed by experts that can ensure their scientific robustness and have been submitted for consultation to a heterogeneous group of stakeholders that has reviewed them and ensured their relevance from a societal perspective; the methodology is made public;