Finland's Climate Panel published a list of measures on Tuesday that the next government should take to cut emissions and grow carbon sinks. The panel says Finland's national climate targets won't be reached with the measures already agreed, and that more action is needed, Yle reported.
Finland has already managed to reduce fossil emissions, but forest carbon sink has been lost at the same time. The panel wants the distribution obligation raised step by step to 100 percent by 2045. The obligation requires fuel distributors to supply a set share of renewable fuels, which cost more than fossil fuels.
It also proposes staggered increases in carbon dioxide-based car and vehicle taxes, more charging points for heavy traffic, road and congestion charges in cities, and state subsidies for walking, cycling and public transport.
The panel says agricultural emissions are still almost unchanged. It sets a target of consuming plant-based protein in the same amount as animal protein, through reforms to agricultural policy, economic steering, food products and public procurement. Rewetting abandoned and poorly productive peat fields into climate wetlands and wetland cultivation would be the largest and cheapest way to cut agricultural emissions, according to the panel.
Results-based payments would steer emission reductions.
Forests are used so heavily that carbon stock growth has stopped, the panel says, putting the EU's 2030 land-use obligation and the 2035 national carbon neutrality goal at risk. It recommends reforming the forest and water laws, longer forest rotation periods, delaying fellings, avoiding clear-cuts in nutrient-rich drained peat forests and sanctions for deviations. The panel also proposes a land-use change fee for removing forest, an energy tax on biomass burned in power plants without carbon capture, bigger energy subsidies for building renovations, and obligations for new data centres to add clean electricity production and low-emission backup power.