On September 14th, 2022, President von der Leyen delivered the annual State of the Union Address. In the course of her speech, President von der Leyen acknowledged the important role played by hydrogen that she considered “a game changer for Europe”. Accordingly, she stressed the need to move the EU hydrogen economy from niche to scale. Thanks to REPowerEU, a plan to rapidly reduce dependence on Russian fossil fuels and fast forward the green transition, the European Union has doubled the 2030 target to produce ten million tons of renewable hydrogen in the EU each year. She eventually announced the creation of a new European Hydrogen Bank that will help guarantee the purchase of hydrogen, notably by using resources from the Innovation Fund, and that will invest 3 billion euros to help building the future market for hydrogen. “This is how we power the economy of the future. This is the European Green Deal”, she concluded.
In ESC’s opinion, it is important that the EU energy policy safeguards the economic interests of the business community, especially SMEs.
For the full version of the speech, please see here.