The European Commission is due to present, most likely on 14 March, its proposal for a Net-Zero Industry Act. This should establish a specific framework to strengthen the clean technology ecosystem in the EU. In a draft of the proposal obtained by EUROPE, the Commission focuses on the first pillar of the strategy: creating a simplified regulatory environment and fast-track permitting procedures for “net-zero technology” manufacturing sites.
It had been repeated many times by Member States: companies need a simpler framework to invest and grow in the EU (see EUROPE 13133/1). To implement this, the Commission identifies nine “net-zero technologies” for which construction or expansion projects will be facilitated. With this approach, the Commission hopes to achieve different production targets by 2030.
The nine sectors concerned are: - photovoltaic solar panels; - wind turbines, including offshore; - batteries; - heat pumps; - renewable hydrogen technologies; - biomethane technologies; - nuclear technologies; - carbon dioxide capture and storage; - grid technologies. This list may be amended by the Commission by delegated act.
The Commission aims to ensure European production of 40% of the EU’s annual needs in these technologies to meet the ‘Green Deal’ and REPowerEU targets. For batteries, for example, it wants to guarantee a production capacity of 85% of the Union’s annual needs in 2030 (40% for solar panels, 85% for wind turbines, 60% for heat pumps and 50% for electrolysers for renewable hydrogen needs).
The idea behind the regulation is to then identify industrial projects around these net-zero technologies, which can benefit from shorter permitting procedures: Eighteen months maximum for a project with a yearly production output of more than 1 gigawatt and nine months for a yearly production output of less than 1 gigawatt.
A new label for clean and resilient projects
The Commission plans to go even further for certain sites, by creating a label for ‘Net-Zero Resilience Projects’. These contribute to even more targeted policy objectives than the zero-emission technology projects, including reducing the EU’s dependencies in certain sectors. For these, the waiting time for a permit should not exceed 12 or 9 months, again if the output is greater or less than 1 gigawatt per year.
Similarly, “Net-Zero Resilience Projects” should be treated as a priority by public authorities, as they should be considered to have a status of “highest possible national importance”, according to the Commission. This also applies to court cases involving these types of projects.
‘Net-Zero Industry Valleys’
To build on this, the Commission wants to see “Net-Zero Industry Valleys” spring up across the EU. These should be identified by the Member States, which should then encourage the establishment of projects in them. Industrialists who would like to set up sites there must benefit from even more accelerated procedures. The above-mentioned deadlines are shortened by 6 months in this case.
The Member State authorities responsible for these valleys will have to ensure that they develop the necessary infrastructure or support private investment in ‘Zero Emission Valleys’.
Facilitate implementation with regulatory sandboxes
The Commission also envisages ‘regulatory sandboxes’ in the Member States to facilitate the installation of projects with a suitable control, testing and validation environment. These regulatory sandboxes are intended to be time-limited and must therefore be completed before a plant is commissioned. Companies can apply for access to these regulatory sandboxes, if they can show the relevance of their project to the regulation.
Member States are required to coordinate their activities on these regulatory locks with each other through a “Zero Emissions Platform”.
A further initiative to simplify procedures is for Member States to establish a single national competent authority responsible for coordinating the granting of permits for zero-emission projects, according to the Commission. This allows companies to have a single point of contact for their procedures.
Mobilising private and public funds
The proposed regulation goes into less detail about the funding possibilities, but emphasises the duty of the Commission and Member States to facilitate access to finance for zero-emission projects. This includes a “net-zero industry platform” where the Commission and Member States will identify financial needs, bottlenecks and best practices. At the request of a project promoter, the platform could, for example, make recommendations on the financing of a project.
The Commission recalls its ambition to mobilise instruments such as InvestEU or the Innovation Fund.
Finally, public procurement can be a vehicle for supporting clean technology projects. To this end, greater account must be taken of the ‘net-zero’ contribution of the applicants, but also of the security of supply in the Union for the product in question.
See the draft version of the document: https://aeur.eu/f/5nl (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)