Because it’s Friday afternoon, I wanted to make sure we had some bad news for you to enter the weekend with.  It’s my gift to you, no need to thank me.  Your Friday buzzkill is that European Union is weakening their very progressive emissions plan, giving more concessions to polluters.  Hooray!  From the New York Times, who hates to see you have fun:

Leaders said the plan, which offers a swathe of concessions to polluting companies and countries, would not jeopardize their overall target of reducing planet-warming emissions by 20 percent by 2020.

But.  BUT.

Under the draft plan, some of the dirtiest companies in Europe, like the utilities that operate coal-fired power stations in Eastern European countries including Poland and Hungary, will no longer have to buy all of their pollution allowances starting in 2013 — as the commission had proposed in January under a draft plan. Instead, those Eastern European utilities will buy just 30 percent of their permits starting in 2013, rising, in principle, to 100 percent in 2020, if the draft is approved.

There is also the possibility that electricity companies could end up with windfall profits based on permits they receive from the government, for free.  Yay!

So, that’s your Friday afternoon news that makes the world a little dirtier.  Even though we can’t do much about the EU’s messing about with their guidelines, we can as individuals takepart to calculate our carbon footprints and try and save energy.  Every little bit helps.

And, yes, I did rip off the Friday buzzkills phrase from The Onion’s AV Club.