European Steel Association EUROFER said that EU steel industry, which has the ambition of reducing its emissions by 55% by 2030 compared to 1990, will be successful only if the Fit for 55 Package puts the right conditions and incentives in place. EUROFER Director General Mr Axel Eggert said “This is a make-or-break moment for Europe’s leadership, we must get it right in order to make the green transition economically and socially viable for everybody, including the steel sector. The pandemic has shown that strategic autonomy is paramount in all industries: only with a steel sector in good health, can the EU pursue its geopolitical, climate, economic and social goals. Steel has been at the heart of the European community since its very foundations in 1950 with the Schuman Declaration. Today, decarbonisation is both a reality and a necessity. We should not put European steel at risk by mistake or as an unintended collateral damage of other policies, as this could put the State of Union itself at risk in the coming years. Instead, the EU should embrace the opportunity of a steel industry that could be the global decarbonisation leader. We therefore reiterate our call on President von der Leyen to meet the CEOs of the EU steel industry for a ‘European Green Deal on Steel.”

The European steel industry calls on the EU legislators to ensure full support in the climate transition by providing:

⦁ Access to affordable low carbon energy, especially electricity and hydrogen;

⦁ Investment support for breakthrough, clean technologies;

⦁ Affective carbon leakage protection -The new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism should be applied until 2030 with the EU ETS currently used benchmark-based free allocation and indirect cost compensations throughout the EU, in order to support companies focussing on low carbon investment and also in order to assess the CBAM effectiveness over time.

EUROFER said “The implementation process of the Fit for 55 package on the ground will be equally important: overly burdensome regulations further worsening the regulatory cost disadvantage of EU companies vis-à-vis its global competitors could jeopardise manufacturing in Europe with preventable plant closures and job losses in the thousands in the steel industry alone. Higher climate ambition and rising carbon prices, which doubled in the last year and tripled in the last two years, require strengthened carbon leakage protection as long as international competition doesn’t face comparable carbon constraints, if any at all.”

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