The European Commission's Green Deal will almost certainly be among the sacrificial victims of the new EU leadership. Many adjustments that could have been made were delayed or neglected altogether, with the result that right-wingers and conservatives had easy attack ground during the election campaign. Ambitious energy transition, companies in difficulty, too tight deadlines, inadequate private investments, as the Commissioner recalled Paolo Gentiloni and much more, have tarnished the great project.
The configuration of a new economic model is not in question because i climate changes they are impetuous and overwhelming to the point that only a few small groups deny the evidence. A cornerstone of the strategy, the target of reduction of 90% of CO2 emissions by 2040, will certainly be revised. Climate and environment are conditioned by the use of energy without which nothing can survive.
Von der Leyen's mistakes
To achieve decarbonisation, the Green Deal has drawn up the death certificate for gas and oil with a final deadline of 2050. In short, in the next quarter of a century, all of Europe (currently at 27) should reconvert production, consumption, trade, styles of life. What the Commission is chaired by Ursula von Leyen he was unable to grasp it when he had the time, which is what happened instead at the end of his mandate. Paradoxically, Europe needs gas precisely to support decarbonisation and what has it done? You asked those who have plenty of it, after the sanctions on Russia. Photovoltaic, wind, nuclear projects, biomass, taxonomy: everything is fine but gas is needed.
Energy Week took place a few days ago in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan which will host the next UN climate conference in the autumn. On that occasion, the new gas supply agreements to Europe were announced. Specifically, one extraordinary supply of 20 billion cubic meters per year by 2027. Furthermore, on 6 June - a few days before the elections - Bulgaria signed two contracts to expand the Trans-Adriatic Gas Pipeline (TAP) which crosses the country. The gas that will transit will not stop there but will arrive in the rest of Europe, creating a new corridor. In fact, Bulgaria is the leading country in strengthening the business system which requires time to reconvert.
The TAP gas pipeline is increasingly strategic
In a nutshell, the Union, despite the 2019 strategy, must replace 100 million fewer cubic meters imported from Russia after the invasion of Ukraine. The TAP that arrives in Puglia transports 10 billion cubic meters per year, but must be enlarged to meet the needs of Italy and consequently of the countries connected with the gas pipeline system. For Italy, new prospects open up in the indispensable transition and with the hypothesis that Azerbaijan goes from second to first supplier. Let the intransigent greens and the populist Five Star newsies get over it.
Such a scenario could have been foreseen after the invasion of Vladimir Putin to Ukraine? Wasn't the death certificate for old energy sources drawn up too quickly? Yes, and many observers predicted it. “We must expect more coordinated actions that arise from good analyzes of the problems and go in a variety of directions,” he told us ditto an expert like the Professor Alberto Clo. Fortunately, many provisions of the Green Deal contain review and update clauses. The time has come to do it. Even with a von der Leyen bis presidency.
