Key messages:

• Massive expansion of cheap renewables will provide emission-free electricity and make deep electrification of all sectors a key pillar for climate neutrality.
• Beyond electrification, innovation, development and diffusion of currently immature technologies (hydrogen, e-fuels, CDR) is required to decarbonise hard-to-abate sectors like heavy industry, freight transport and aviation.
• A substantial increase in the strength and ambition of EU climate polices is essential in order to achieve ambitious climate targets for 2030 and 2050.
• The consistency of climate policy with broader industrial and socio-economic policies will be essential if the full economic benefits are to be realised and potential negative effects avoided.

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Key messages:

• Policies need to be designed and maintained that enable private capital to flow into low-cost project finance.
• Policy makers should use the window of opportunity provided by low general interest rate levels post COVID-19 to tackle the climate and the economic recovery challenges at the same time.
• Public funds and banks should be used to provide the right type of capital and enable financial mainstreaming of low-carbon assets.
• The European Green Deal provides an excellent policy framework to integrate financial and sector/ technology policy.

Key messages:

• The biochar system is an exceptional negative emissions technology (NET) that can remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it in soil, thereby improving soil and conserving water, as well as having other possible uses.
• The lack of an enabling and supportive policy framework at the EU level, has been the main barrier to widespread diffusion of the biochar system.
• Widespread diffusion of the biochar system will require its greenhouse gas removals from the atmosphere to be financially rewarded, but its many benefits could then lead to wide public acceptance.
• The policy framework to support NETs, including biochar, needs urgently to be agreed and implemented.

Key messages:

• Strong policies are needed to push the EU transport system towards adopting zero-emission technologies tailored to the different transport markets across the EU.
• Short-term transport decarbonisation priorities include the mass adoption of electric vehicles with a low-carbon electricity generation.
• Investing in charging infrastructure is key to solve the “chicken-egg” problem for the widespread uptake of electric vehicles in urban areas.
• Hydrogen-based liquid fuels and advanced biofuels will help reduce emissions in hard-to-electrify sectors such as aviation and shipping.

Key messages:

• A net-zero EU in 2050 requires net-zero electricity emissions by 2040.
• Achieving net-zero electricity emissions by 2040 in the EU is possible and affordable.
• Net-zero electricity emissions by 2040 requires existing instruments to be tightened and extended in order to set out a clear long-term pathway to this goal.
• There are technical challenges to the operation of zero-carbon electricity systems, which need to be addressed early, to ensure a smooth and secure transition.
• Investments in innovation and skills, attending to all stages in the innovation chain, remain crucial to supporting the transition and capturing its economic benefits.
• The political challenges are as important as the technical challenges, with attention to just transitions at the regional scale essential to meet net-zero targets.