Poland's reticence to commit to high emissions targets is causing consternation in the EU Shutterstock

Days before taking up the presidency of the EU Council, Poland opposed a widely supported commitment to cut carbon emissions in the bloc over a long-term period.

In a meeting of EU environment ministers, all but one EU country – Poland – agreed in principle to the European Commission’s 2050 Low Carbon Roadmap, which calls for a 40 percent cut in carbon emissions by 2030, 60 percent by 2040 and 80 percent by 2050, compared to 1990 levels.

A consensus was also reached concerning a target of 25 percent cuts by 2020 (up from 20 percent), but this was also opposed by Poland.

“We expect greater solidarity from Europe, and an understanding of the situation of individual member states,” Polish Environment Minister Andrzej Kraszewski said in a statement.

Poland, which uses coal to produce 90 percent of its electricity, perceives Brussels’ ambitious environmental policies as a threat to its own economy.

But other European leaders disagreed. “It’s a dark day for Europe’s leading role in tackling climate change,” UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne said in a statement.

“I am deeply disappointed that the only country in the EU that could not accept a good compromise on how we can move Europe to a low carbon economy was Poland,” he added.

While Poland’s stance is nothing new (the country led opposition among other EU emerging economies to the EU’s 2020 emissions reduction targets in 2008), this latest move comes at a moment when Europe’s eyes are on the country as it takes up the presidency of the EU Council from July 1.

Following the environment ministers’ meeting, Greenpeace sent a translation of an article published in Nowy Przemysł in May to EurActiv and The Guardian. In the article, Polish EU budget commissioner Janusz Lewandowski said that, “the thesis that coal energy is the main cause of global warming is highly questionable,” and that, “Question marks are appearing more and more frequently over global warming itself.”

As WBJ went to press, MEPs had demanded that EC President José Manuel Barroso react to Mr Lewandowski’s comments.

So could environment prove to be Poland’s bugbear during its time at the head of the EU Council?

In May, a group of eight Polish think tank experts wrote an open letter warning climate-change issues were all but absent from the government’s presidency program.

“Were Poland to take the role of a country which neglects the issue [of climate change] or indeed treat it as a threat to its well being … then our position in the EU will suffer. Our presidency’s achievements in other fields will be dimmed,” read the letter.

The experts were specifically worried about Poland’s capacity to coordinate a common EU position for the UN climate conference in Durban, South Africa, which will take place in December.

Now, even before the start of the Polish presidency, it seems their fear that Poland would appear as a lone crusader on climate change issues was justified.

“I am not surprised at all,” Bartłomiej Nowak, executive director of Warsaw’s Center for International Relations and one of the letter’s signatories, said when asked about Poland’s stance.

The World Bank has provided Poland with both detailed analysis and more recently a $1.11 billion loan to help the country cut emissions without undermining growth.

Asked to react to the news, the managment said that historical dependence on coal was a particular challenge for Poland, but that "We trust that our recent report and technical and financial support have contributed to Polish efforts to move to a low emissions economy."