On Tuesday, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen officially proposed Netherlands’ Wopke Hoekstra as the new commissioner for the fight against climate change. The incumbent foreign minister of the Netherlands is supposed to be in charge of European climate diplomacy – so he will play an important role in the run-up to COP28 and at the climate conference itself. This means he will only take over half the portfolio of his predecessor Frans Timmermans, who left the Commission to run for Prime Minister of the Netherlands. The other half – the ongoing implementation of the Green Deal in Europe – lies with the Slovak Maroš Šefčovič, who has taken Timmermans’ role as executive vice-president of the Commission.