In response to Trump, Brussels is under pressure to contain the green agenda

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Large companies and national governments increase the pressure on Brussels to restrict its sustainability agenda, while a violent debate on the effects of Donald Trump’s deregulative efforts is led to the EU.

The latest call to reform the rules that suffocate the investments, according to companies, came from the American oil and gas group Exxonmobil. European President Philippe Ducom said that “very little” of the 30 billion euros that were intended for investments in technologies such as hydrogen and CO2 separation would flow to Europe due to its “careless, excessive and expensive regulation”.

“Europe often tries to do the right thing, but it is wrong,” Ducom told the Financial Times.

In his latest position paper, the influential European Roundtable for Industry, which belongs to the Union’s largest industrial, consumer and energy companies, also expressed violent criticism of the regulations that are supposed to combat climate change and improve the behavior and investments of companies.

“There are too many complex and generally vague definitions and terms as well as unclear reports and disclosure obligations,” it said.

President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen Last week was asked by business leaders in Davos to quickly reduce regulatory stress for companies. A European managing director said Europe was losing “competitiveness every day”. Another said it was absolutely necessary to change the perception of the US financiers who currently consider Europe to be “uninvestable”.

Von der Leyen has made the simplification of sustainability reporting a central goal of its second term at the head of the EU Executive. However, companies and governments are increasingly afraid that this will not be sufficient to ensure the blocking of the block, in particular in view of President Trump’s tax and controlling agency in the United States.

Among the national governments that have increasing pressure on Brussels, France called for a “massive regulatory break” last week in legislation, which covers everything from chemicals to financial guidelines.

The German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who is imminent in February, called for a two -year postponement of stricter rules for the sustainability reporting of companies that will come into force for the largest companies from January this year in a letter to the European Commission.

The advance represents a clear turnaround by the EU heads of state and government who had previously supported a robust climate protection plan to encourage it to encourage them to address the environmental pollution behind global warming.

In 2022, French President Emmanuel Macron welcomed the rules on sustainability reporting as a way to the “reform of capitalism”.

But a weakening economy and the pressure of right parties as well as the challenge of the new US government have forced political decision-makers in the EU to face the counter reaction.

Last week Trump criticized the EU legislation in a video address before the World Economic Forum as “very cumbersome”, in which he also denounced the block because of his tax and trade regime and his own deregulatory efforts.

In her own speech in Davos, Leyen admitted that “too many companies hold investments in Europe back due to unnecessary bureaucracy”. The Commission will initiate a “far -reaching simplification of our rules for sustainable finances and duties”, promised.

In February, a proposal is to be submitted that provides for cuts in the company reporting regulations in three important guidelines- sustainability reporting, supply chain laws to cover environmental and human rights violations as well as green definitions for investments.

The Commission has announced that it will reduce the reporting obligations for larger companies by 25 percent and 35 percent for small companies. This emerges from a design of a document in which plans are presented to improve the competitiveness of the EU.

However, the revisions have already led to disagreements within the Commission and between Member States and legislators, especially in countries in which companies have already prepared themselves for the new registration rules.

“We have to do something, but it’s also about predictability (for companies),” said another high-ranking EU diplomat.

Experts also fear that Brussels will be pushed to an overly large back through the pressure of the United States.

Martin Porter, managing chairman of the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, said that there is a “clear risk” that “a comprehensive simplification agenda has already invested guidelines against which companies have already invested”.

This contradicts the overarching goal of the EU to use sustainability as a competitive advantage that would contribute to the growth of its economy, he added.

Additional reporting from Ben Hall