Germany and Italy have expressed support for reevaluating the official G7 policy on new fossil fuel investments in third countries, deviating from their previous position. Bloomberg was the first to disclose last weekend that Germany had proposed that the G7 countries lift their unilateral restriction on investing in fossil resources in non-G7 nations during their meeting, which got underway on Sunday in Germany.

A draft of the proposal seen by Bloomberg said that G7 had to “acknowledge that publicly supported investment in the gas sector is necessary as a temporary response to the current energy crisis.”

The proposal also suggested that this should be done “in a manner consistent with our climate objectives and without creating lock-in effects.”

Then, according to Reuters, the meeting’s members were debating whether the self-imposed embargo could be relaxed without jeopardising net-zero promises. Mario Draghi, the prime minister of Italy, also showed his support for the proposal.

The proposition is being made as European economies scramble to find alternate sources of energy to take the place of Russian hydrocarbons to continue operating.

Voicing his disapproval, a senior associate at climate think tank E3G, Alden Meyer, told Bloomberg that: “This would be a huge setback from the progress we made last month at the G-7 energy and environment ministers when we finally brought Japan, the last G-7 holdout, into the commitment to end such financial support for fossil fuels.”