Middle East conflict drives up energy costs: European Commission president

The Middle East conflict has imposed heavy economic costs on Europe, driving up energy prices and adding billions of euros to import bills, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday.

"Since the beginning of the conflict, gas prices have risen by 50 percent and oil prices by 27 percent," von der Leyen told the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

She said 10 days of war had already cost European taxpayers an extra 3 billion euros (3.48 billion U.S. dollars) for fossil fuel imports.

Von der Leyen said the European Commission is assessing additional measures to lower energy bills, including a possible cap on gas prices.

She said the EU had diversified its fossil fuel supplies in recent years, but "this does not mean that we are immune to price shocks. Energy markets are global."

The surge marks the second time in recent years that geopolitical conflict has triggered sharp rises in EU energy costs, following the Russia-Ukraine conflict in 2022.

The commission is also pushing nuclear power to boost production and cut prices. Von der Leyen announced on Tuesday a 200 million euro (231.75 million dollar) EU guarantee to support private investment in innovative nuclear technologies.

EU Energy Commissioner Dan Jorgensen urged member states on Tuesday to cut energy taxes where possible, particularly on electricity, to lower consumer bills.

The commission on Tuesday also unveiled a Clean Energy Investment Strategy aimed at channeling private financing into power grids, clean energy technologies and energy efficiency.

Middle East conflict drives up energy costs: European Commission president

Middle East conflict drives up energy costs: European Commission president

Middle East conflict drives up energy costs: European Commission president

Middle East conflict drives up energy costs: European Commission president

Smart technologies have reshaped China's ecological and environmental monitoring system, Huang Runqiu, minister of Ecology and Environment, said Thursday in Beijing on the sidelines of the fourth session of the 14th National People's Congress(NPC).

"Regarding ecological and environmental monitoring, we have been promoting the digitalization, informatization, and intelligentization of the entire monitoring process in recent years, reshaping the ecological and environmental monitoring system. For instance, in water environment monitoring and sampling, we have used intelligent drones which can quickly locate sampling points, collect samples accurately, return rapidly, and they are safe and reliable, improving work efficiency by over 70 percent. They are particularly advantageous for sampling during flood seasons and in remote areas," Huang told the press.

"In terms of environmental sample analysis, we have developed 'lights-out laboratories' in recent years. As the name suggests, these labs operate without lights and are unattended. Through robotic arms, robots, and intelligent management systems, they achieve full-process automation and intelligence from sample handover, testing, and analysis to report generation. This has significantly enhanced work efficiency, increasing it by more than eightfold compared to traditional labs. More importantly, it reduces human interference, human error, and even data falsification," he said.

Thanks to the improved ecological and environmental supervision capabilities, the number of environmental violation cases nationwide has decreased from 130,000 five years ago to 43,000 last year, representing a decline of 68 percent, Huang said.

The minister said China has already applied environmental DNA technology in the biodiversity monitoring work.

"In the field of biodiversity monitoring, monitoring aquatic organisms remains a weak point. However, significant progress has been made in recent years as we have developed environmental DNA technology. Although this chip is very small in size, it contains DNA detection information for aquatic organisms, including the finless porpoise and the Chinese sucker, from 19 state-controlled sections in the Jiangsu segment of the Yangtze River. The results showed that over the past five years, more than 20 species of aquatic organisms have increased in this river section, fully demonstrating the tangible effectiveness of the ten-year fishing ban in the Yangtze River," Huang said while showing a chip to reporters.

The 14th NPC, China's national legislature, concluded its fourth session on Thursday.

Smart technologies reshape China's ecological, environmental monitoring system: minister