On 7 May 2024, the Commission adopted an Implementing Regulation updating the templates for Member States to report their climate action data.
Specifically, the templates that were updated concern the reporting by Member States on:
- the use of revenues generated by the EU Emission Trading System (EU ETS) Directive, which must now be fully dedicated to climate action;
- emissions at national level covered by the Effort Sharing Regulation;
- emissions and removals at national level covered by the Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) Regulation.
The data collected through these reporting templates helps the Commission determine whether Member States and the EU are on track towards their climate targets, and feeds into the annual EU Climate Action Progress Report.
The updated templates take account of developments in the context of the Paris Agreement on the accounting of removals from bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (bio-CCS), which Member States will be able to report in their inventories starting this year.
Given that removals from bio-CCS are not currently regulated under EU climate law, they cannot be counted when assessing whether Member States are achieving their targets on cutting greenhouse gas emissions under the Effort Sharing Regulation. Member States will nevertheless be able to report on the volume of removals generated through bio-CCS, thus providing transparent data on this emerging technology.
