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Even if driven much farther, 150,000 kilometers, an electric car’s CO2 emissions will be only 28% less than those of a gasoline-powered car. During the car’s lifetime, this will prevent 11 tons of CO2 emissions, or about €44 of climate damage.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphGiven the size of the subsidies on offer, this is extremely poor value. Denmark’s subsidies, for example, pay almost €6,000 to avoid one ton of CO2 emissions. Purchasing a similar amount in the European Emissions Trading System would cost about €5. For the same money, Denmark could have reduced CO2 emissions more than a thousand-fold.

Experience in Eastern Europe, where energy prices had to be increased substantially in the 1990’s, demonstrated that simple measures – such as better insulation, together with maintenance and repair of the region’s many long-neglected central heating systems – yield a quick and substantial payoff in reducing energy intensity.

All long-term budget decisions require unanimous approval by the member states, a rule first established when the grouping, then known as the European Economic Community, had just six members, not 27. The power of veto makes any major change to spending all but impossible and entrenches the status quo, no matter how unworkable or unpopular.

“It is extremely difficult to change anything,” Mr. Sapir said. “Everyone is always fighting at the margins over narrow national interests. They try to make sure they get money for their own countries and that cuts go to other countries.”

But figures released in 2010, disputed by Malawi’s ministry of agriculture, suggest that the harvest was only 2.1m tonnes. If maize production had risen as much as claimed, Malawians should have have had a surplus of maize and prices should have dropped. That did not happen, says Mr Jerven.

European utilities like E.On of Germany have announced plans to shut down less-polluting natural gas-fired plants that have been undercut by dirtier coal-burning generators benefiting from a flood of low-cost coal imports and low carbon emissions prices.

Despite the upfront costs associated with green energy projects, they are inexpensive to run. In contrast, Europe’s gas and coal plants, which also provide backup power when renewables cannot operate, need constant spending on fossil fuels.

“An inefficient and opaque energy sector continues to weigh heavily on public finances and the economy,” the International Monetary Fund said, noting that energy subsidies reached 7.5 percent of Ukraine’s GDP in 2012. “The very low tariffs for residential gas and district heating cover only a fraction of economic costs and encourage one of the highest energy consumption levels in Europe,” the IMF said in December.

Gazprom also agreed to eliminate contract clauses that said a country such as Germany could reship Russian gas only with Gazprom’s approval.

Citing its poor finances and a mountain of debt, the Italian government is now curbing new subsidies for renewable energies.

farm spending remained the largest single portion of the budget, accounting for about 38 percent of the total — although that was down from about 42 percent in the previous seven-year budget period.

In the Baltic nations, for example, farmers are furious that a system of cash payments to support agriculture is skewed in favor of farmers from richer countries like France and the Netherlands. Latvian farmers say they get less than 40 percent of the European Union’s average payment level for each acre of land. Dairy farmers say they fare even worse, getting just 20 percent of what their Dutch counterparts receive.

Critics mocked it as “the Common Agricultural Policy in the sky,” a reference to Europe’s program of subsidies for farmers, which eats up nearly 40 percent of the union’s total budget.

It is deeply troubling that it took Europe’s leaders so long to see something so obvious

What is now proposed is recapitalization of the European Investment Bank, part of a growth package of some $150 billion. But politicians are good at repackaging, and, by some accounts, the new money is a small fraction of that amount, and even that will not get into the system immediately. In short: the remedies – far too little and too late – are based on a misdiagnosis of the problem and flawed economics.

Europe’s leaders have finally understood that the bootstrap operation by which Europe lends money to the banks to save the sovereigns, and to the sovereigns to save the banks, will not work.

The euro was flawed from the outset, but it was clear that the consequences would become apparent only in a crisis.

Workers may leave Ireland or Greece not because their productivity there is lower, but because, by leaving, they can escape the debt burden incurred by their parents.

Germany worries that, without strict supervision of banks and budgets, it will be left holding the bag for its more profligate neighbors. But that misses the key point: Spain, Ireland, and many other distressed countries ran budget surpluses before the crisis. The down

turn caused the deficits, not the other way around.CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraph