Memo to the commissioner responsible for energy

Memo

Memo to the commissioner responsible for energy

Publishing date: 04 September 2024
Authors: Simone Tagliapietra Georg Zachmann

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The great momentum in Europe’s energy transition must continue during your mandate. Electrification is the primary tool for reaching climate targets. Fortunately, you take office against a backdrop of huge global innovation and cost reduction in clean technologies. Your first challenge will be to ensure security of energy supply as electrification raises questions about infrastructure and cyber-security risks. You will also need to deploy efficient frameworks, including a European fund, to ensure the necessary green investments are made, particularly in European electricity grids.

You should work with national capitals to eliminate remaining energy imports from Russia. You should lead negotiations on the 2040 climate targets, which would see EU emissions falling by 90 percent compared to 1990. Finally, you should propose a European Energy Agency to deliver the better data policymakers and investors need to better understand Europe’s energy transition.

Key actions:

Resolve electrification infrastructure issues
Promote investment, especially in grids
Exit the energy trade with Russia

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About the authors

Simone Tagliapietra

Simone Tagliapietra is a Senior Fellow at Bruegel, a Professor at the Florence School of Transnational Governance of the European University Institute and an Adjunct Professor at the School of Advanced International Studies Europe of The Johns Hopkins University. His research focuses on the EU climate and energy policy, and on its industrial and social aspects. He also is a Member of the Board of Directors of the Clean Air Task Force and Senior Associate of the Payne Institute at the Colorado School of Mines. He holds a PhD in International Political Economy from the Catholic University of Milan.
Georg Zachmann

Georg Zachmann is a Senior Fellow at Bruegel, where he has worked since 2009 on energy and climate policy. His work focuses on regional and distributional impacts of decarbonisation, the analysis and design of carbon, gas and electricity markets, and EU energy and climate policies. Previously, he worked at the German Ministry of Finance, the German Institute for Economic Research in Berlin, the energy think tank LARSEN in Paris, and the policy consultancy Berlin Economics.