Signs of progress towards a new European Union climate target emerged ahead of a summit on Thursday with a draft plan by leaders to bring Poland on board and acceptance of the goal by the Czech Republic under certain conditions.
The leaders' discussion in Brussels will be their first talks on upgrading the existing EU target of a 40% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. Their two-day summit is likely to push a decision to December.
The EU's executive, the European Commission, has said the bloc needs a cut of at least 55% by 2030, against 1990 levels, to achieve the goal of net zero emissions by 2050 that all 27 nations bar coal-dependent Poland have committed to.
"If we set a very clear and a high target of 55%, it effectively gives certainty to industry that there will be a guaranteed market for solutions and services and products," Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins told reporters on arrival for the summit.
Such investments could include clean transport and renewable energy, he said.
The Czech Republic, home to an energy-intensive automotive industry, has said it cannot achieve the 55% emissions cut this decade. But on Thursday, Prime Minister Andrej Babis said he could support the goal at EU level, so long as it was not binding at national level.
"Every country has a different energy mix and we have to take it into consideration. So if we agree on a 55% average in the EU, the Czech Republic doesn't have any problem," Babis said.
Separately, 11 EU countries - among them, France, Estonia, the Netherlands and Sweden - on Wednesday published a joint statement supporting the "at least 55%" goal.
EU member states, which take decisions by unanimity, need to agree a common position on the 2030 target and then strike a deal with the European Parliament, which wants a 60% cut.
Draft conclusions for the two-day summit, seen by Reuters, do not endorse a specific 2030 climate target but say EU leaders will "return to the issue" at a meeting in December, with the aim of striking a deal by year-end.
The conclusions, dated Wednesday, offer some concessions to Poland, which has said it cannot agree to any new climate target without further analysis of how the goal would affect individual countries.
"[The Council of EU leaders] invites the Commission to conduct in-depth consultations with member states to assess the specific situations and to provide more information about the impact at member states' level," the draft said.
Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki is self-isolating after contact with a person infected with COVID-19 and will be represented at the summit by Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis, a Polish government spokesman said on Twitter on Thursday.
"Without Poland, no decisions will be made," the spokesman said.
