Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development in the EU: Evolution, Governance and Competitiveness

This article considers how the EU governance set-up evolved with respect to environmental protection and sustainable development. It aims at evaluating the EU’s progress towards creating the basis for a competitive, low-carbon European economy (a kind of EU industrial strategy) and sustainable production and consumption patterns. The article concludes that environmental and energy policies have become increasingly Europeanized and come under the single market and competitiveness rationale. It puts forward that the shift to a low-carbon economy is associated with important economic benefits, whereas economic costs appear overrated. However, shortcomings in EU governance sit uneasily with a more coherent approach to sustainable development.