New Policy Brief: Separating the Technical from the Political: The Use of Delegated and Implementing Acts in EU Climate Policy and Implications for Democracy
A new policy brief by our partners Jeffrey Rosamond, Claire Dupont and Brendan Moore, Separating the Technical from the Political: The Use of Delegated and Implementing Acts in EU Climate Policy and Implications for Democracy, discusses that a growing share of EU climate decisions bypass traditional legislative routes. Instead, they pass through fast-track "delegated and implementing acts" managed by the European Commission.
While designed for speed and efficiency, their rapid increase triggers serious concerns about EU climate democracy. Delegated acts handle minor technical updates, leaving the European Parliament and Council just two months to object without proposing changes. Implementing acts provide instructions to member states with no parliamentary role at all, relying instead on member-state expert committees. This system is remarkably fast; between January 2020 and September 2025, fifty-six percent of climate-related implementing acts were finalized in just one to ten days. As the EU's climate policy has grown more complex, these fast-track acts have surged. Across all policy fields, the Commission adopted 135 delegated and 248 implementing acts in 2020, skyrocketing to 193 and 846 respectively by 2024.
However, the authors find major deficiencies across accountability, representation, knowledge and participation. Sidelining the Parliament cuts short debate, making processes highly opaque and threatening public trust. Knowledge integration is equally low; only twenty-seven percent of climate delegated acts between 2020 and October 2025 actually involved an expert group meeting. Public participation is also sparse. Only sixty-four percent of delegated acts and thirty-one percent of implementing acts were opened for consultation, and nearly half of those delegated consultations received ten or fewer responses. The core danger arises when these fast-track processes stray into deeply political territory. A prime example is the EU Sustainable Taxonomy, where the highly contested decision of whether to classify gas or nuclear energy as sustainable was treated as a technical update rather than being subjected to the robust transparency and open debate of standard legislative procedures.
To protect climate democracy while maintaining efficiency, the brief outlines several crucial recommendations. First, delegated and implementing acts must strictly stick to their intended technical purpose, supported by clear mandates in original laws. The Parliament and Council require more resources to track, debate, and object if the Commission oversteps. Finally, the Commission must improve communication with NGOs, open up expert meetings to public scrutiny and replace the "Have Your Say" portal with transparent, systematic stakeholder consultations
Read the full report: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21135593
