Law No. 3991-IX (the Law) establishes Ukraine's overarching response to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The Law is aimed at implementing the EU's Regulation (EU) No. 2018/1999 on the governance of the Energy Union and the mitigation of climate change and Regulation (EU) No. 2021/1119, establishing a framework for achieving climate neutrality (the "European Climate law"). The law establishes a target to achieve climate neutrality of Ukraine by 2050 in a "socially fair and economically efficient transition", and aims to set out a framework for achieving low carbon and sustaianble development, ecological and food and energy security in Ukraine. To achieve its net zero target, the law also establishes an interim target of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by at least 65 percent by 2030, in accordance with 1990 levels.
The law mandates that the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine (the Cabinet) must ensure the development and implementation of measures to create infrastructure and other material and technical conditions that are needed to implement the state’s climate policy. The Cabinet is also required to issues act on state climate policy issues (that fall within its powers) including approving the National Energy and Climate Plan, Ukraine’s nationally determined contribution to the Paris Agreement, the Long-Term Low-Carbon Development Strategy of Ukraine (the Long-Term Strategy), the Strategy for Adaptation to Climate Change, and sectoral programme documents that seek to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and provide for adapting to climate change. Every year (and no later than 1 June), the Cabinet must submit to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine a progress report on the implementation of the mitigation and adaptation policies, and progress to implementing the Long-Term Strategy, the National Energy and Climate Plan, and the Climate Change Adaptation Strategy.
The law requires the central body of executive power, which ensures the formation and implementation of state policy in the electric power, nuclear industry, coal industry, peat mining, oil and gas, and oil and gas processing complex, to be involved in the development of the National Energy and Climate Plan, in addition to developing sectoral plans for reducing ghg emissions and adapting to climate change, in accordance with its powers.
The law also requires the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, local state administrations, and local self-government bodies to develop and ensure the implementation of regional plans for mitigating and adapting to climate change (that fall within their jurisdiction), and to report on the implementation of regional plans to the relevant council.
The law establishes a Scientific and Expert Council on Climate Change and Ozone Layer Preservation to provide scientific support and aid in the preparation of reports on achieving Ukraine’s climate policy, and to monitor the implementation of measures, amongst other responsibilities. Section IV of the law sets out fiscal and market mechanisms for achieving the objectives of Ukraine’s policy, in addition to measures on informing the public and access to information on climate change.
