On 26 February 2025, the European Commission (Commission) adopted an Omnibus Sustainability package and an Omnibus Investment package.

The Commission’s work programme, published on 11 February 2025, announced a first series of “Omnibus” packages intended to address overlapping, unnecessary or disproportionate rules that are creating unnecessary burden for EU businesses. The proposals now published are designed to provide substantial simplification in the field of sustainability and EU investment programmes.

Omnibus Sustainability package

The Omnibus Sustainability package includes a:

  • Proposal for two Directives amending the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD).
  • Draft Delegated act amending the Taxonomy Disclosures and the Taxonomy Climate and Environmental Delegated Acts subject to public consultation.
  • Proposal for a Regulation amending the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) Regulation.
  • Proposal for a Regulation amending the InvestEu Regulation.

The main changes being proposed to the CSRD and the CSDDD are summarised in Q&As.

In particular, the CSRD is being changed so that the number of companies in scope will be reduced by about 80%. The reporting requirements would only apply to large undertakings with more than 1,000 employees (i.e. undertakings that have more than 1,000 employees and either a turnover above EUR 50 million or a balance sheet total above EUR 25 million). Companies outside the scope of CSRD (companies with up to 1,000 employees) may choose to report voluntarily on the basis of a simplified voluntary standard to be adopted by the Commission, based on the voluntary standards for SMEs developed by the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group.

A key proposed change to the CSDDD is to give companies more time to prepare for implementing the new framework by postponing, by one year, the transposition deadline (26 July 2027) and the first phase of the application of the sustainability due diligence requirements, covering the largest companies (to 26 July 2028). Also, the necessary guidelines by the Commission will be advanced to July 2026, allowing companies to build more on best practices and reduce their reliance on legal counselling and advisory services.

The proposed amendments to the Taxonomy Disclosures Delegated Act and the Taxonomy Climate and Environmental Delegated Acts include simplifying the reporting templates, introducing a materiality threshold to make disclosure of alignment for companies with less 10% eligible activities not mandatory, introducing the option of reporting partial disclosure to foster transition finance, simplifying and make more useful the Green Asset Ratio used by banks, reducing the scope for mandatory reporting on operational expenditure and simplifying certain ‘Do no significant harm’ criteria.

The changes to the CBAM Regulation include simplifying the small occasional importations of CBAM goods, below the maximum threshold of 50 tonnes per year. This threshold corresponds to approximately 80 tonnes of CO2 equivalent on average per importer. These importers will no longer be subject to any CBAM obligation.

Omnibus Investment package

The Omnibus Investment package amends the InvestEu Regulation, the Regulation on the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI Regulation) and legacy financial instruments.

The InvestEU and EFSI Regulations will be simplified with a view to reducing the frequency and the content of some reports.

The proposal to amend the InvestEU Regulation would also help mobilise additional EUR 50 billion of investment by increasing the size of the EU guarantee by EUR 2.5 billion and facilitating the combined use of the InvestEU guarantee with existing capacity available under three legacy programmes (EFSI, CEF Debt Instrument and InnovFin Debt Facility) to support new InvestEU financing and investment operations.

Next steps

The legislative proposals will be submitted to the European Parliament and the Council for their consideration and adoption.

The changes on the CSRD, CSDDD, and CBAM Regulation will enter into force once the co-legislators have reached an agreement on the proposals and after publication in the EU Official Journal.

In line with the Communication on simplification and implementation published on 11 January 2024, the Commission invites the co-legislators to treat these packages with priority, in particular the proposal postponing certain disclosure requirements under the CSRD and the transposition deadline under CSDDD, as they aim to address key concerns identified by stakeholders.

The Commission has issued a call for evidence on the draft Delegated act amending the Taxonomy Disclosures and the Taxonomy Climate and Environmental Delegated Acts. The call for evidence closes on 26 March 2025. The draft Delegated Act will be adopted after public feedback and will apply at the end of the scrutiny period by the European Parliament and the Council.