Industrial decarbonisation Archives

Chancellor Scholz's long-held plans to establish a "climate club" of ambitious countries will finally see the light at the COP28 summit in Dubai, with 33 members initially expected to join, including all G7 countries, Chile and Mozambique. 

EU countries and the European Parliament said Wednesday (29 November) they have reached a preliminary agreement on curbing industrial emissions, including those from intensive poultry and pig farms and from ore mines.

The German Greens have adopted a European Parliament election programme which highlights the need for carbon capture and storage, a historic shift for the party.

It is hard to find many critics in Brussels of the EU’s new carbon levy that came into force in October. The Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism is one of the few major pieces of law passed by Ursula von der Leyen’s European Commission that secured cross-party support in the European Parliament. 

The German government is poised to put its weight behind a network of hydrogen pipelines stretching 9,700 kilometres and coming at a cost of €20 billion in a bid to solve the hydrogen economy's ‘chicken-and-egg' dilemma.

Instead of attacking and seeking to halt carbon capture and storage, journalists and environmental campaigners should be holding oil companies and countries to account, demanding that they deliver on their CCS commitments, writes Robin Mills.

For decades heavy industry around Dunkirk in northern France has belched out millions of tonnes of climate-heating gases. Now the area close to the Belgium border – one of Europe's industrial powerhouses – wants to catch its pollution before it escapes.

The European Parliament’s industry committee voted on Wednesday (25 October) to put nuclear back on the list of technologies eligible for preferential treatment as Europe looks to reshore production of technologies deemed crucial for a net-zero world.

Too many countries have vetoes or taboos about clean energies, like nuclear or sustainable bioenergy. The fact is, we simply cannot afford to exclude any measures that can substantially help decarbonisation, argue Alan Finkel and Noé van Hulst.

China’s decision on Friday (20 October) to curb graphite exports raised the question of creating new EU strategic stocks of critical raw materials, a question that has so far been largely overlooked by Brussels.

Representatives of energy-intensive industries have urged the government to decide on subsidies for electricity prices, which, while strongly discouraged by economists, will be the point of discussion in Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s discussions with government leaders.

The emerging CO2 storage market in Europe is becoming increasingly controlled by a North Sea monopoly, putting at risk the decarbonisation of Southern and Eastern Europe, write Eadbhard Pernot, Martin Birk Rasmussen and Lina Strandvåg Nagell.

Denmark and the Netherlands signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Monday on the sidelines of the EU Environment Council in Luxembourg, pledging to cooperate on carbon capture and storage (CCS) and CO2 transport.

The European Commission has rejected the Greek government's plans for large industrial consumers of electricity like aluminium or chemicals to pool demand for renewable power as a way of lowering their operating costs, causing dismay in the metal industry.

The first phase of the EU's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) kicks in on Sunday (1 October), obliging exporters in six carbon-intensive industrial sectors to report their emissions to EU authorities. 

Europe’s net-zero goals will almost certainly not be achieved without significant deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology, writes Chris Davies. Suggesting that use of CCS should be limited even before it has begun is hardly the best way to solve the climate crisis, he argues.

Belgium has launched a call for proposals to prepare its ports to import massive amounts of green hydrogen as part of its efforts to become a 'hydrogen gateway', Belgian Energy Minister Tinne Van der Straeten announced.

As the European Union finalises its hydrogen and gas rulebook, key issues remain on how to remunerate network operators for building and maintaining Europe’s future hydrogen grid.

Upcoming EU legislation should limit the use of industrial carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology to truly unavoidable emissions, write Leon de Graaf, Dominika Floriánová, Antoine Grall and Ella Oksala.

Germany will not be able to meet all of its hydrogen demand from piped gas, the cheapest way of transporting hydrogen, forcing the country to rely on costlier shipping options instead, according to a new study by influential think-tank Agora Energiewende.

While Europe has adopted stringent standards for the production of renewable hydrogen, regulatory battles in the US may prove decisive for the fate of the EU electrolyser industry.

Deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) needs to increase at least 100-fold by 2050 for the world to meet its net-zero emissions goals. The US and Norway illustrate how effective government policy can help achieve this, write Jarad Daniels and Nils Rokke. 

Demand for renewable hydrogen in Europe is expected to hit 8.5 million tonnes by 2030, far below the EU's planned 20 million tonnes, according to the industry, which calls for a shift in strategy to ramp up supply and demand.

The French government will release €4 billion in subsidies in the form of public-private contracts for the development of low-carbon hydrogen projects as part of the country's updated national hydrogen strategy.