BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) - European Union governments broadly welcomed proposals Monday for the EU to spend dozens of billions of euros (dollars) to fight global warming in the years ahead and, stressing that time pressing, committed to adopt them by year's end.
At a meeting, the EU environment ministers praised the European Commission for proposals to slash greenhouse gases by 20 percent by 2020 - or 30 percent even, if the United States and others join Europe in a global climate accord when the current one expires in 2012.
Matthias Machnig, the German delegate, said Berlin supports the package whose key feature is an auctioning system through which heavy industries will have to buy permits to pay for the pollution they cause.
"The credibility of the EU (in fighting climate change) is at stake," he said, adding the EU "needs to be the vanguard" of global efforts for a cleaner environment.
But while the climate change package received high marks, the 27 EU environment ministers disagreed on some of the fine print.
Germany - home to a huge automobile industry - objects to limiting car emissions to 130 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometer. German statistics show its high-end carmakers BMW AG and Daimler AG would have to cut average emissions by about 25 percent or face huge fines.
Still, Germany, France and many others said they will work to see the climate change package - which the European Commission unveiled Jan. 23 only - adopted by December at the latest. They must then be approved by the European Parliament before they become law across the EU.
Under the package, heavy industries may end up paying as much as €50 billion ($75.8 billion) a year in emissions charges that will fund the development of clean energy.
To prevent companies from leaving the EU or their non-EU competitors from getting a competitive edge, the EU wants to sign a global emissions deal with the United States and other industrialized nations.
Biofuels must account for 10 percent of transport fuel, but their production must be environmentally neutral. Also, wind, solar and energy crops - which must account for 20 percent of EU energy use by 2020, up from 8.5 percent today - may save 900 million metric tons (992 million tons) of carbon dioxide emissions, according to the European Commission.
It foresees a fivefold increase by 2016 in the annual turnover of the EU's renewable energy sector which is currently only about €30 billion ($45 billion) a year.
