The EU’s reputation as a model of environmental responsibility may soon be history. The European Commission wants to forgo ambitious climate protection goals and pave the way for fracking — jeopardizing Germany’s touted energy revolution in the process. It seems that the climate is no longer of much importance to the European Commission, the EU’s executive branch. As of 2020 at the latest — when the current commitment to further increase the share of green energy expires — climate protection in the EU will apparently be pursued on a voluntary basis. --Gregor Peter Schmitz, Spiegel Online, 15 January 2014
