Head of IEA Roasts Europe for “Slow Electrification”
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Europe still uses a lot of fossil fuels. Four years since Russian invaded Ukraine and threw European energy supply into chaos, one would think the continent would have electrified heating and transport more in order to quickly ween itself off of fossil fuel dependence. Well, Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), certainly thinks they should have done so.
Electricity’s share of overall energy use in the European Union (EU) is just about 23%, a relatively low electrification rate, especially for a place that has had such shocks in recent years from oil and gas dependence.
“This is in my view a major mistake for Europe,” Fatih Birol said. “In general, I would have hoped and expected that Europe would have been more responsive to this crisis.” Count us in. But Birol and the IEA saying this is a significantly bigger deal than someone like me saying this.
Birol emphasized that he expects the EU to do a better job and catch up to China, Japan, and South Korea, all of which have an electrification rate above 30%.
A few months ago, in March, the IEA actually urged more people to cut their commuting and work from home amidst the US–Iran war, which was “creating a major energy crisis.” Clearly, people in the industry have gotten spooked by this war and crisis, yet electrification in the place you’d expect it most has been quite slow and lame.
“Europe’s energy commissioner Dan Jorgenson also admitted the EU’s heating, transport and industrial sectors remain reliant on imported fossil fuels,” City AM adds. “This reliance has left states, including the UK, scrambling amid the conflict in the Middle East, after US strikes damaged oil fields and other major ports, constraining global supply.”
Ironically, even amidst all of this, the European auto industry has been pushing to lower CO2 standards and weaken electrification requirements, sometimes successfully! However, it seems that some policy improvements may be coming.
“The Commission will lay out plans next week to require countries to lower taxes on electricity and offer support to encourage households to adopt heat pumps, electric cars and other green technologies.
“The plans would partly be achieved by mandating that electricity be taxed less heavily than fossil fuels, but these measures could prove expensive for countries that are heavily reliant on taxation coming from electricity bills.”
Can we expect significant progress from the EU? When are we going to see the Union reach 30% electrification?
Featured photo by Anastasia Shuraeva, via Pexels.
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