After decades of warnings, it seems that the green transition – the huge change that should slow down, mitigate, and eventually stop, if not reverse, the threatening deterioration of living conditions on this planet – is finally on everybody’s lips. This edition of Perspectives explains the concept of a just transition - a way to make the change without leaving anyone behind.
Over the past year, we have witnessed ever-increasing public interest in issues related to the environment and climate change. In spite of this, progress on Chapter 27 has, in many ways, remained in quarantine.
The RES Law sets the grounds for substantial reforms in the Serbian renewable energy sector and introduces a number of leading-edge solutions to the Serbian and regional electricity markets. The RES Law further aligns Serbian legislation with that of the EU, thus making a significant step towards fulfilling Serbia's commitments under the Energy Community Treaty.
The Law on Energy has not been significantly changed to date. The enactment of the Law on Amendments to the Law on Energy, which entered into force on 30 April 2021, further regulated energy subsectors such as electricity, renewable energy sources, natural gas, oil and oil derivatives and thermal energy.
The report “Walking in the Mist” is the seventh annual report by Coalition 27 on important developments and changes in the area of environmental protection and climate change in Serbia. With this Report, the Coalition would particularly like to emphasize that the decision-making processes in the field of environment and climate change is still not transparent to the public.
The report Chapter 27 in Serbia: Money talks is the 6th annual report that tackles important developments in the area of environmental protection and climate change in detail. This Coalition 27 report covers the period between March 2018 and February 2019 and as such it follows the annual report publication of the European Commission.
This issue of Perspectives is dedicated to climate change mitigation in the Western Balkans, because of both the global need to limit global warming but also because mitigating climate change, as the articles show, goes hand in hand with development both in terms of economic growth and in terms of health, wellbeing and societal development.
With this context in mind, the articles before you shed light upon some of the commonly overlooked aspects of it but also point to solutions which are good starting points for any future changes in how we think of energy, development, and public good more broadly.