This is the first policy paper of a series within the framework of the wider study. Further publications will be released in September 2020 and in the first quarter of 2021. There will be three in total.
The Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS),Karl-Renner-Institut and Austrian Chamber of labour (AK) have started a research project entitled “A fiscally sustainable public investment initiative in Europe to prevent climate collapse”. The research aims to pursue three objectives:
- Are the planned measures laid out in the European Commission’s Green Deal roadmap enough to meet the Paris targets?
- Are publicly funded climate infrastructure investment initiatives fiscally sustainable?
- What is the revenue potential of a European wealth tax to fund climate action?
The first part of the project will analyse the Commission’s 2050 and EGD roadmap and assess whether the outlined measures represent a plausible strategy to meet the key Paris Agreement target. This will yield a comparison of the roadmap with the requirements suggested by the scientific evidence (as represented, for instance, by the IPCC reports). The main question for such a comparison will be: What is the nature (what kind of action is needed, what are the likely consequences of inaction) and scale of the problem? Does the roadmap convincingly identify (which sectors, which technologies) and quantify the necessary investment requirements?