Europe Drafts Green Investment Standards From Cars to Houses

(Bloomberg) -- Europe is seeking to define what qualifies as green across the economy in a bid to attract billions of euros into projects compatible with its ambition of becoming the world’s first climate-neutral continent.

The European Union’s regulatory arm will next week unveil the first set of criteria for investment decisions in the unprecedented transition to a low-carbon economy. The standards for whether an activity contributes to the fight against climate change will cover dozens of industries, from transport to water supply and renewable energy.

The classification system for green investment, known as taxonomy, is part of a broader package to make the 27-nation bloc’s finance more sustainable. It will underpin the region’s economic recovery program centered around the Green Deal, a sweeping strategy to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.

As the EU shifts away from fossil fuels, it seeks to entice its industry to embrace cleaner energy sources. The green label system will apply to sectors across the economy, which will get assigned emissions or efficiency criteria for their products to be qualified as sustainable, according to a draft of the EU measure obtained by Bloomberg News.

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