Dr Ben Allen is the Acting Executive Director and Research Director at IEEP. He holds a degree in Environmental Biology and a PhD in the field of Land Use and Spatial Ecology and has over fifteen years of experience working on EU land use, circular-bioeconomy, and climate policy in both the public and private sector. Ben’s skills relate to the development of sustainability criteria and benchmarks to support the integration of environment and climate objectives in economic activities. In this role, he is the co-rapporteur for the technical working group of the European platform on sustainable finance. He has a particular understanding and interpretation of the dynamics between land and bio-resource use and their drivers, having played a central role in research in this area.
A political agreement was found for the first step of the EU Taxonomy. This represents a major achievement for the EU’s sustainable finance agenda, yet political decisions and lack of transparency endanger the scientific basis on which the strength of the Taxonomy rests.
EU bioenergy and its use of biomass have several impacts on the biophysical system. This report provides a meta-review of the use of biomass within biophysical limits in the context of the EU Green Deal.
Today IEEP responded to the public consultation on the draft sustainability criteria for the sustainable finance taxonomy. In the call for feedback, the Platform on Sustainable Finance is gathering evidence to strengthen the final recommendations to the European Union.
Policies that serve current and future generations should be developed with a robust science-policy interface. The EU Taxonomy process teaches valuable lessons on the need to strengthen the elements that underpin decision-making. IEEP, together with Marzia Traverso (RWTH Aachen University) draw conclusions on transparency, independence and accessibility of scientific evidence in the political decision-making process.
New technical screening criteria for Biodiversity, Water, Pollution, Circular Economy to guide private investments are out for review under the EU Taxonomy framework.