The EU must do more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions if it is to avoid a "global slow lane" in the drive to build a low-carbon future, British, French and German ministers have warned.

Writing in an article published in the Financial Times, Le Monde and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne, along with his German and French counterparts, said the EU should raise its emissions reduction target to 30%, claiming there was a "tremendous opportunity" to stimulate growth, provide jobs, improve energy security and tackle climate change through shifting to a green economy.

A failure to do so, however, would condemn Europe to a bleak future of heightened costs, volatile prices and the ravaging effects of global warming, said the ministers.

The EU, which agreed to cut emissions by 20% 18 months ago, said it would up its target if other countries and supranational bodies, such as the UN, showed similar ambition - a drive that last year's Copenhagen talks failed to deliver.

Copyright © Press Association 2010

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Paul Brennan, Head of Morgan Cole's Energy and Environment team observes that Huhne's call for increasing the EU emissions reduction target to 30% be 2020 is in line with the Coalition Agreement. With little public money available, and a limit to the costs that can be passed on to consumers and industry, Government may be tempted to adopt a radically interventionist approach to the energy markets in an attempt to achieve the transition.