“The announcement of ambitious but in reality ineffective initiatives seems to have become a tactic of the Commission to reconcile favorable and opposed countries”

Ith draft European regulation for a zero-emission industry (Net Zero Industry Act, NZIA) which was proposed by the Brussels Commission on March 16 aims to develop clean technology manufacturing in the European Union (EU). This theoretically welcome move is part of a broader industry plan to respond to the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

But several aspects of the NZIA are problematic, such as the idea of ​​allowing authorities to override certain regulations to fast-track strategic projects. Either these regulations are legitimate and effective, in which case strategic projects should not be exempted, or they are in fact harmful, in which case they should be revised, not only for strategic projects but also more generally, or even removed. !

However, the most fundamental problem with this proposal is that it perfectly illustrates the damaging way in which the European Commission very often tries to achieve pseudo-consensus on the crucial issues on which EU countries fundamentally disagree . The NZIA was presented as a proactive policy leading towards an ambitious goal; in this case, giving the EU the capacity to provide annually, by 2030, 40% of the clean technologies it has need.

Means not commensurate with ambitions

But the proposed measures, which consist mainly of giving priority to strategic projects in terms of administrative authorization and judicial treatment, do not live up to these ambitions. This pattern has unfortunately repeated itself several times in recent years. In 2010, the Commission’s “Europe 2020” strategy set many targets for the EU, including for research and development spending to reach 3% of gross domestic product or for poverty to be reduced by 25%, but without no substantial tool is created to achieve these goals.

In 2014, the Commission, under the leadership of its then president, Jean-Claude Juncker, promised a massive boost in investment, to the tune of more than 300 billion euros. But, as a majority of countries did not want to put in place a massive public investment plan at the time, the Commission had to find another way to keep its promise and scrounged a few billion from the EU budget to developed a complex financial mechanism through the European Investment Bank, which ultimately convinced no one.

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