Lionel Laurent, Columnist

Germany Is Undermining the Climate Change Fight

The European Investment Bank is deciding whether to stop funding fossil fuel projects. Berlin’s pushback on this is deeply troubling.

November 6, 2019 at 6:30 AM UTC

By Lionel Laurent

Lionel Laurent is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist writing about the future of money and the future of Europe. Previously, he was a reporter for Reuters and Forbes.

The gas is always greener.
Photographer: Sean Gallup/Getty Images Europe

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The European Union’s 555 billion-euro ($600 billion) lending arm, the European Investment Bank, will choose this month whether to sign off on a plan to ditch fossil fuel projects almost entirely and boost support for clean-energy finance.

The decision has been delayed by pushback from Germany and some central European nations. That says a lot about Berlin’s muddled approach to tackling climate change, and how that’s holding Europe back.