Net Zero Industry Act: EU must think bigger and bolder to really change the game

The EU is scrambling to retain its strong position in the race to decarbonise as the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) sets out the new rules of the game. It may not be quidditch, but held within its Green Deal Industrial Plan and the forthcoming Net Zero Industry Act – the EU’s answer to the IRA subsidy splurge – the bloc may well yet be in possession of the golden snitch: its wider strategy of competitive sustainability.

The Net Zero Industry Act clearly has the potential to enhance the attractiveness of the EU investment environment, with the power to act as a crucial net zero accelerator as competition increases from well-disposed partners like Biden’s America, and strategic rivals such as Xi Jinping’s China.

Ursula von der Leyen launched the Green Deal Industrial Plan hoping it could “make Europe the home of cleantech and industrial innovation on the road to net-zero” and an early draft of the Net Zero Industry Act accordingly sets out new targets of at least 40% of clean energy technologies to be manufactured in the EU by 2030.

The various planned measures within the Net Zero Industry Act – aimed at identifying goals for net zero energy industrial capacity, providing a regulatory framework, ensuring rapid and coherent permitting, and developing standards to support the scale-up of technologies – all make good strategic sense as part of the overall approach to enhance the EU’s supply-side interventions. They make access to increased public funding easier and quicker for innovative companies seeking to scale up net zero products and services in Europe, and the necessary new focus on clear targets and support for domestic net zero energy industrial manufacturing and services is a welcome addition to existing mainly demand-side measures found in the ‘Fit for 55′ package and other climate policies.

Learn more: Edie