EU-ASE at M&M and Reuters Breakingviews Predictions 2021

On 26 January 2021, EU-ASE president Monica Frassoni participated in the webinar “Reuters Breakingviews Predictions 2021”  hosted by M&M in collaboration with Reuters Breakingviews. Ms Frassoni took the floor in the second part of the webinar, which focused on how cities will rebound from the Covid-19 crisis, highlighting the key role of energy efficiency for green recovery.

The session also featured Kostas Bakoyannis, Mayor of Athens, and Stefano Boeri, internationally renowned Architect and Urban Planner, and was moderated by Rob Cox, Global Editor of Reuters Breakingviews.

The recording of the webinar is available here.

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IEA: Energy Efficiency 2020 Report

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EU-ASE at Climate Week NYC 2020: A Solution Set for Complex Challenges

On 23 September EU-ASE president Monica Frassoni participated in this Climate Week NYC webinar, hosted by the EE Global Alliance and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy.

During the event, leaders from the private, public, and non-profit sectors explored how clean energy and energy efficiency technologies and expertise can help meet the trio of challenges posed by COVID-19, economic recovery and climate change. Strategic deployment of this “solution set” will deliver significant gains in emissions reductions, improved community resilience, human health and safety, and the creation of new jobs and a more sustainable economy.

Attendees heard key takeaways from the special Economic Recovery edition of the EE Magazine, published by AOB Group and the EE Global Alliance, launched the same day of the event.

  • During the first session, the authors, including Monica Frassoni, discussed the key takeaways from their articles, focusing on energy efficiency’s role in economic recovery across the globe.
  • During the second session, clean energy executives discussed how to tackle these challenges vis-à-vis the deployment of clean energy solutions, smart public policy and project design, and strategic deployment of procurement, finance, and technologies.

View a recording of the launch webinar here.

Click here to read the EU-ASE article in the EE Magazine Special Edition on EE and Economic Recovery.

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EU-ASE at IEA’s 5th Annual Global Conference on Energy Efficiency

On 23 June 2020 EU-ASE president Monica Frassoni participated in the online panel debate “Learning from global best practice” as part of the International Energy Agency’s 5th Annual Global Conference on Energy Efficiency. Here is her full speech

I would like to thank the IEA for your excellent work to make the energy efficiency (EE) agenda credible at global level. About 10 years ago it gave a major global push to show the role and the amazing potential of EE in buildings, transport, and industry and this was a major help for all the EE business and social community in the EU. As EU-ASE we have often used this work to make our agenda stronger, as our work focuses mostly on the EU legislation, at a supranational level.

Referring to what Mr Mathur said before – that EE is like a plane and it takes effort for a plane to take off – well in the EU we are still in the middle of the take-off effort. We cannot say that we are tapping the great potential of energy efficiency to contribute to the clean energy transition and to climate neutrality. We will not be able to overcome the Covid-19 shock and reach climate neutrality without additional financial and legislative measures and a better implementation of the current legislation.

The EU is tight together by common political, legal, and financial instruments, expressed in regulations, targets, subsidies and incentives. This is the case also for EE.

Today, as a result of the current crisis, we are at a decisive moment There is a lot of political work at all levels, intense discussions and work within the EU institutions, Member States, businesses, and the NGO community to make sure that the recovery measures will take the right direction.

A lot of things still ne to be done to mainstream energy efficiency in EU policies. Still, I would like to mention three EU “best practices” that are relevant globally, even if we are still far away from having a clear picture of how successful these will be.

The European Green Deal, in which energy efficiency has a key role to play, is important because it is a deal, it is green, and it is European. The Green Deal works as a framework for the implementation of the current rules and sets a direction for the next EU legislation.

In terms of energy efficiency there are three policy initiatives which are crucial to accelerate EE in the coming years. One is the Sector integration strategy, to be published in July. The second one is the Renovation wave initiative, that for us is key. Many speakers already mentioned the importance of renovating buildings, well, for the EU, the Renovation Wave is a major instrument to reduce emissions by 2050 to make the EU climate neutral. Increasing the current rate of renovation by three times is the main challenge we have in front of us.

Moreover, there is an upcoming review of the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED), which needs to be revised to make it up to the climate targets. We would like to see that the EU sets a GHG target of at least 55% by 2030 to achieve the climate neutrality goal by 2050.

Another very important element which was mentioned by Minister Claude Turmes this morning concerns the EU budget and the Recovery plan. We believe there should be a clear earmarking of EU funds not only to climate activities but also to the renovation of buildings. There is still a huge risk that the Recovery Plan will put resources to activities which are not in line with the EU climate goals.

We also call to increase the “climate action quota” to 40% for the entire EU Budget. And to explicitly exclude from all EU funds any fossil fuel activities. Finally, a small note concerning hydrogen and the hopes that it is raising in the public debate. We see a lot of space for hydrogen in hard-to-decarbonise sectors, namely in transport, but the main solution in buildings remains energy efficiency.

To conclude, I can say that in the EU we have the framework, we have some best practices, but we still have a lot of work ahead to deliver the policies needed in the next 20 to 30 years.

 

The recording of the full panel is available here

 

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The vaccine to future crises is sticking to climate neutrality

by Monica Frassoni, President of the European Alliance to Save Energy (EU-ASE)

This op-ed was published on Foresight


While helping workers and companies survive the current crisis, the European institutions should confirm and accelerate the EU’s path to carbon neutrality by 2050, including fixing emissions reduction targets in line with science.

The effects of Covid-19 affect all of us, citizens, businesses and policymakers, and put us in front of a highly disruptive and unprecedented situation. This emergency is forcing us to quickly find solutions to come out as soon as possible from a standstill that touches all aspects of our lives.

What is even more worrying, however, is that this crisis might not be unique in the upcoming years. Even before the outbreak of Covid-19, it was already well-known that challenges such as climate change, pressure on resources and social inequalities required deep transformations in our ways of producing, consuming, living and moving at every level, from local to global. The current crisis has made this clearer. As we plan the next economic recovery measures, we cannot limit ourselves to repair what has been broken. We must collectively build a more sustainable and resilient society to be able to prevent, or at least limit, damages from future shocks. To do this, common, coordinated action is necessary and the EU’s input and guide are precious.

That is why it is key to resist calls to water-down or postpone the European Green Deal from those arguing that in these difficult times supporting the economy no matter what should be prioritised over preparing our transition to a sustainable society. As an association representing strong, global businesses, we believe this dichotomy is false and counterproductive. On the contrary, the Green Deal is the best available, if not the only, growth strategy for the present and the future.

We will all benefit from the acceleration of investments stemming from the Green Deal and Europe’s drive towards climate neutrality will create opportunities that will help us out of the current economic standstill while preventing the future health, economic and environmental crisis that is likely to happen if we fail to keep the global temperature increase below 1.5°C. By basing economic stimulus plans on energy and resource efficiency, circularity and inclusion, European governments could boost economic recovery and job creation in key sectors such as construction, transport, energy, agriculture and manufacturing.

While helping workers and companies survive the current crisis, the European institutions should confirm and accelerate the EU’s path to carbon neutrality by 2050. A clearer roadmap for 2030 and 2040, fixing adequate targets of emission reductions in line with science, is needed. Moreover, we need an efficient and more easily accessible financial framework to help unlock and direct the enormous amounts of private and public investments that will be available in the next months. Finally, the planned revision and update of existing EU legislation, notably in the energy and circular economy sectors, must not be delayed.

In addition, if we are to build a sustainable, resilient and inclusive EU economy we need to overcome existing barriers. These include the insufficient implementation at national level of current legislation, particularly when it comes to energy efficiency and renewables; cumbersome procedures making green investment and the use of available resources difficult for those which could most benefit from them (such as SMEs, local authorities and communities); and hesitations and delays to realise the much-needed phase out of fossil fuels.

The Green Deal is not yet a given. It still needs to be clearly defined and its implementation faces today unexpected challenges. Still, we believe that business and societies are more and more aware that we cannot simply go back to where we were before. Europe needs a clear direction, sufficient resources and a sound and shared set of rules to move beyond the shock of Covid-19 and prevent future crises. Sticking to the climate neutrality path is the only way allowing to do both.

 

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