Six principles for the new European Commission to follow

EU needs a “visible hand” to achieve climate neutrality by turning knowledge into jobs

Jorgo Chatzimarkakis is CEO of Hydrogen Europe

Five years to go until 2030, the fast-approaching deadline for so many EU climate objectives. The new European Commission must be proactive and use these next five years constructively, if we are to achieve what we must.

The new college has been proposed and still needs to pass the hearings, which ought to be swift and decisive. Looking forward, I believe six principles should guide the new commissioners if we want to be successful until 2030.

1. Fail forward Europe! 

The European Green Deal was one of the biggest regulatory efforts ever achieved at the European level, covering an enormously wide range of components within our economy.

However, where many things are addressed in such an expansive and ambitious manner, superfluous complexity arises. Indeed, a common criticism of the EU is that, for all its good intentions, it ends up developing a bloated and complex regulatory system which is not fit for purpose, particularly when it comes to the urgent transition to a net zero economy.

Ursula von der Leyen has made crystal clear that she will remove unnecessary burdens in the first hundred days of her new term.

We need to learn from mistakes in order to develop further. Let’s clearly name these mistakes and rectify them.

2. Europe needs a visible hand!

‘It’s the economy, stupid’ was the mantra of Bill Clinton’s US presidential campaign. Yet, today’s framework has changed dramatically, and it is not just the market and its ‘invisible hand’ – as coined by Scottish economist Adam Smith - that sets the scene.

Concrete targets and measures have been taken by the two largest economies, the US and China, on a global scale. The hand is now very much visible, and we need one of our own in this new EU commission instead of blind trust in market forces.

Mario Draghi has written down where to go.

3. Freedom is more important than free trade!

The freedom of economic choice is at stake if our dependence on critical technologies and products continues to rise, especially if this dependence relies on China.

Unfortunately, unbridled free trade can exacerbate these issues rather than solve them.

We must reckon with the idea that less free trade can create more freedom. Freedom is the higher value that we ought to preserve.

4. Clean technologies have highest geostrategic relevance!

Climate change is an existential threat to our civilization.

Despite all our efforts, we have not made any significant progress so far. We haven’t even reached peak oil consumption and, although the expansion of renewable energies is at its highest level, the world has never consumed as much coal.

Clean technology is the only way out of this.

We Europeans must therefore place even greater emphasis on the innovation and deployment of clean technologies.

The Draghi report describes, directly and effectively, how Europe needs to take this new priority seriously.

5. Europe becomes the global laboratory for a circular economy achieving climate neutrality!

The fight against climate change will not be decided primarily in Europe, but our contribution to the global effort will be central to the cause.

Europe has always led the clean technology revolution, at least when it comes to research and development. We should continue to be pioneers in that regard and demonstrate how new technologies can be combined and improved to achieve climate neutrality.

Much of our available financial resources should be directed to the decarbonisation of energy and industry in the regions where the effect will be greatest.

We must remain pioneers, not only for ourselves, but to deliver these much-needed solutions worldwide.

6. Turning knowledge into jobs and create life chances!

Europe is still strong in inventing and in coming up with new ideas, but remains extremely weak in turning these innovative ideas into products and jobs.

To improve here, we must enlarge our capital markets and fight for every viable technology.

We are too fast to give up on our innovations and too slow to recognise their transformative economic potential from a skills and employment perspective. We need to understand that turning knowledge into skills, and skills into jobs, is a worthy - if costly – cause.

These jobs will not only mitigate global warming but create better opportunities for the population here and abroad.