Debate: The EEAS’s Climate Change and Defence Roadmap
Date: MONDAY, 6 JUNE 2022
Speaker: Thomas Waitz
Country: Denmark
Language: EN

All sectors of our economy and all sectors of our society actually have to contribute and are contributing to a CO2 neutral society. While the military services and security services, especially the military services, are not even mentioned in the Paris Agreement – we have to be aware of that – they are one of the biggest emitters and one of the biggest absorbers of fossil fuels that we have in our societies. But through climate mainstreaming by the European Commission and the Green Deal and all of us together, this also has an impact on our security services.  So there is a clear demand also towards the security services to reduce their CO2 emissions by 30%. And knowing that far more than 50% of the CO2 emissions actually come from cooling and heating or from procurement and other services, we see that there is a huge potential, even before we start talking of potentially electrifying tanks.  And this may sound like a joke, but I had conversations with generals who saw the security advantage of possibly actually producing their own fuel on the base somewhere in the Sahel zone to actually run some of their equipment without being dependent on fossil fuel deliveries.  We have to be aware that this report is pointing out clearly towards the security needs that we are having also, in terms of cooperation with local populations, which is very much also related to the question whether we are equipped for extreme weather. What advantage does it have if we have equipment on the ground, which we cannot use because it’s just too hot or weather extremes are preventing us from using it?  But also equipping our missions with the tools to actually cope with extreme weather can also be of use to also help civilians and local populations to cope with extreme weather. And this cooperation with local populations is also key for us in terms of peacebuilding, in terms of peace making, in terms of also cooperating on local solutions, which also make our civilian and military missions more secure for our staff. So this cooperation, local cooperation, is key. And yes, the experience of many of our generals is that the cooperation, especially with women on the ground, is very much delivering – you’ll find this in the report.  We also have to see that we need climate experts in our missions because, meanwhile, we have data where we can actually already see well ahead where potential conflicts or already existing conflicts are accelerating through climate data because a lot of the conflicts that we see are actually based on land and water conflicts. And to use these data to bring them all together, to analyse them and to have people on the ground that are able to cope with this  information will allow us and can allow us to also prevent conflicts and prevent actual clashes and and violent activities on the ground.  And last but not least, there’s a lot of initiatives across all sectors. We’re having it in the External Action Service, we’re having it in the Defence Fund. NATO is working on climate strategies. National governments are working on climate strategies. And this report also points out that we need to align all of that to one common defence and climate strategy. It is very important that we use the knowledge that is there, the activities that are there, because we need to accept the reality that this is the biggest security threat we have in the long and medium term. We need to be prepared for this. We launched this report with the hope that we’re going forward to these long-term solutions with some goals.