Brussels, 16 September 2008

Brussels, 16 September 2008 - Euro Coop, the European Community of Consumer Cooperatives, welcomes the vote of the European Parliament (EP) Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) on the proposed Renewable Energy Directive. Thanks to this decision, the ITRE Committee has backed EU legislation that paves the way for massive investment in renewables. Green MEP Claude Turmes, who shepherded the file through the EP, showed its enthusiasm for the result reached by commenting that the day of the vote was "a great day" for renewable energies in Europe.

Euro Coop supports key amendments aiming at the quick development of all necessary physical connections to the grid, priority access and precedence during dispatch for renewable energy. Regarding the biofuels topic, Euro Coop considers that the ones deriving from non-food crops (second generation) should be further developed. Whereas in fact a large-scale development of biofuels deriving from food crops (first generation) could harm the environment and threaten people's livelihoods while producing scarce results in tackling climate change, newer alternatives can lead to more promising results. While welcoming the search for alternative renewable energy sources, Euro Coop thus invites the competent authorities to further promote research on biofuels derived from non-food crops.

Rosita Zilli, Euro Coop Policy Adviser for Environmental and Ethical issues, stated after the vote that "The Rapporteur has done a very good job in achieving such a strong cross-party agreement and the message delivered to the Council could not have been stronger". The Officer continued by affirming that "It is now essential that the Member States take on board the European Parliament's proposals if they are serious about negotiating a successful agreement right in time for the forthcoming international negotiations on climate change."

Consumer co-operatives, as responsible economic and social actors, are active long since in fostering the use of renewable energy sources to satisfy their energy needs and many of them have already reached substantial results in this field. The promotion of renewable energies is in fact one of the strongholds that consumer co-operatives cultivate in order to fight climate change. To tackle this challenge forward, they have put in place a broad and all-encompassing series of concrete actions aimed in particular at changing consumer-purchasing patterns.

EURO COOP is the European Community of Consumer Cooperatives, whose members are the national organisations of consumer cooperatives in 18 European countries. Created in 1957, EURO COOP today represents over 3,200 local and regional cooperatives, the members of which amount to more than 25 million consumers across Europe.

For more information please contact:

Rosita Zilli, Policy Adviser, Euro Coop
Tel: +32 (0)2 285 00 72
E-mail: rzilliateurocoop.coop