Energy Efficiency, GHG Emissions, Regulation  -  March 17, 2023

European Union Commission Proposes Net-Zero Industry Act 

The  European Union Commission proposed the Net-Zero Industry Act to scale up manufacturing of clean technologies in the EU and make sure the Union is well-equipped for the clean-energy transition. 

This initiative was announced by EU President von der Leyen as a part of the Green Deal Industrial Plan.

The act will strengthen the resilience and competitiveness of net-zero technologies manufacturing in the EU, and make its energy system more secure and sustainable. 

It will create better conditions to set up net-zero projects in Europe and attract investments with the aim that the Union's overall strategic net-zero technologies manufacturing capacity approaches or reaches at least 40% of the Union's deployment needs by 2030. This will accelerate the progress towards the EU's 2030 climate and energy targets and the transition to climate neutrality, while boosting the competitiveness of EU industry, creating quality jobs, and supporting the EU's efforts to become energy independent.

The proposed Regulation needs to be discussed and agreed by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union before its adoption and entry.

“We need a regulatory environment that allows us to scale up the clean energy transition quickly,” President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said in a statement. “The Net-Zero Industry Act will do just that. It will create the best conditions for those sectors that are crucial for us to reach net-zero by 2050: technologies like wind turbines, heat pumps, solar panels, renewable hydrogen as well as CO2 storage. Demand is growing in Europe and globally, and we are acting now to make sure we can meet more of this demand with European supply." 

The proposed legislation addresses technologies that will make a significant contribution to decarbonization such as solar photovoltaic and solar thermal, onshore wind and offshore renewable energy, batteries and storage, heat pumps and geothermal energy, electrolysers and fuel cells, biogas/biomethane, carbon capture, utilization and storage, and grid technologies, sustainable alternative fuels technologies, advanced technologies to produce energy from nuclear processes with minimal waste from the fuel cycle, small modular reactors, and related best-in-class fuels.