Europe's ambitious plan to tackle climate change was wilting under pressure Thursday with EU leaders set to tailor the final package to take account of national concerns about its economic impact.

Italy and Poland brandished the threat of a veto if their reservations were not taken into account, while Germany, Europe's largest economy, also voiced concerns over the environmental plans.

[...]

Last year, EU leaders vowed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent by 2020, compared to 1990 levels. They also pledged to have renewable energies make up 20 percent of all energy sources.

But many EU nations have begun to balk at the costs involved and the consequences to industry of the climate change goals when they are cut up into individual national targets.

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was the most outspoken on Wednesday, threatening to to torpedo the EU climate change plans, branding them too big a burden for business amid the global financial crisis.

The draft legislation needs the backing of EU governments and the European Parliament. The Parliament's environment committee endorsed the main elements on Oct. 7.

Under voting rules for EU governments, the bloc of eight eastern European countries would fall short of the votes needed to block the package without Italy's support. Sarkozy said he didn't expect Italy to try to block the
legislation, calling Berlusconi a pragmatist open to compromises.

"We don't think this is the moment to push forward on our own like Don Quixote," Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi told reporters. ``We have time."

[...]

"I have announced my intention to exercise my veto," Belusconi told a news conference on the sidelines of a European Union summit in Brussels, following in the footsteps of an earlier threat by Poland.

"Our businesses are in absolutely no position at the moment to absorb the costs of the regulations that have been proposed."

Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told Reuters: "It is a difficult poker game in which Poland is ready to present its veto if there are attempts to force us into agreement on the climate package next month. We cannot agree to that."

It sets the goal of cutting carbon allowances year-on-year, to achieve an emissions cut of 21% by 2020 compared with 2005 levels.

"We will find an agreement" on the package, French President Nicolas Sarkozy told journalists yesterday (15 October) in Brussels following a dinner of the EU's 27 heads of state and government organised as part of the 15-16 October European summit.

"In times of economic downturns, members [of Congress] are extremely reluctant to add burdens to the economy, and we're going to confront that problem," says Rep. John Dingell, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. The Michigan Democrat recently introduced a proposal to cut U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions 6% by 2020. Environmental groups want cuts of 20%-25% during that period.