Fragmented markets and rising energy costs challenge Europe’s industry. This Davos 2026 session explores solutions for faster growth and clean power.
At Davos 2026, leaders argued Europe is not lagging on clean power shares but is struggling on affordability and delivery. IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol rejected “Europe bashing,” noting “70% of Europe’s electricity comes from clean power” versus “40%” globally, yet warned European power prices are “3 or 4 times higher” than in the US or China. He blamed two strategic errors: the decline of nuclear from “over 30%” to “about 15%,” and Europe “dropp[ing] the ball” on solar manufacturing as China came to produce “80% of the solar panels.” The priority, he said, is “electrify everything,” enabled by “grids, grids, grids” and new pricing approaches.
Romania’s Energy Minister Bogdan Ivan emphasized “decisions based on data, not ideology,” urging faster permitting and a technology-mix including gas, hydro, storage, and nuclear, framing energy as “freedom… democracy.” Vattenfall CEO Anna Borg argued the real question is whether Europe can compete “in an economy… based on fossil fuels,” given €400 billion annual import dependence; she called for stable policy, system-level planning, and market designs that value reliability (especially nuclear). Business leaders stressed predictability over headline prices and faster, simplified permitting. A striking bottleneck: 80GW added, but “more than 400GW” of renewables waiting for grid connection.
Welcome back to the World Economic Forum Annual Gathering 2026. And for this interesting session, can Europe compete on clean Power? Now for the next 45 minutes we are going to be discussing this well, billion euros question, fragmented markets, high energy costs and slow permitting are squeezing European industry while global competitors surge ahead. Deeper market integration, smarter different regulation and faster grid investment could cut costs and revive growth now. Yet progress for the moment is still dragging. Europe commit to turning the energy transition into a source of competitiveness for the bloc, or will it continue to fall behind? This is what we're going to be discussing this afternoon at the World Economic Forum in Davos with our speakers. And also we will have the opportunity to get the questions from the audience who are here with us in the room by the end of the session. Let's go straight to it. And it is my great honor to introduce the speakers here with us. We have Fatih Birol, Executive Director, International Energy Agency. Thank you for being here. Bogdan. Ivan, Minister of Energy of Romania, thank you for being here. Thank you. Ana Borg, president and chief executive officer of Sweden International Business Council. Thank you for being here. And Kevin Zimler, chief executive officer and board member, Sabanci Holding, Turkey Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders. Thank you for being here. My name is Sasha Boccolini. I'm your news correspondent, and I'm going to be moderating the session for the next 45 minutes. I would like to open the floor with a bit of a wider and more vague question, and I would like to start with you, please, on it. Europe is quite often criticized for being too slow, for taking too much time for certain decisions. I would like to ask you, how do you see Europe's clean energy transition when it compares with global competitors?
So I will not give a. Broad answer to your question about Europe. Is being criticized for being too slow because I don't agree.
You don't agree that.
Europe is I don't agree today. Europe today. Europe's the share of clean energy in Europe is 70% and the global average is 40%. So if we were to slow Europe, it wouldn't be there. This is one part, but in general there is a bit of a Europe bashing around and I think one has to look at different parameters about Europe, of course, is every country, every region. Europe has its own challenges, deficiencies, difficulties, but sometimes it's going too far, I should say, especially when it comes to clean energy. Europe has 70% of Europe's electricity, comes from a clean power and global averages 40%. The problem in Europe is, in my view, is not only the share of the clean energy, but the price of electricity. Price of electricity in Europe is very high compared to, I don't know, the competitors such as U.S., such as China, 3 or 4 times higher than those, regions, those countries. And as such, a major challenge for the competitiveness of European industry, especially for the electricity energy intensive industries. I want to go one step back. I think Europe why we are here, this challenge of the electricity prices in Europe is we make, in my view, in Europe, two strategic mistakes when it comes to power. And we are paying the we are paying the cost of it, number one. The end of 1990s, the share of nuclear power in Europe was over 30%. And then European countries, almost all of them, turn their back to nuclear power, either phase out or didn't build. Nuclear power plants stop. And very soon this 30% comes down to about 15%. And now many of them, is, changing their policies late, but better that it never happened. The last example is Bundeskanzler March last week said that it was a strategic mistake for Europe. I am very happy to see that because throughout my all my visits to Berlin, I get a lot of bruises of saying that Germany made a mistake, big mistake. And German Industrial is paying for that. This number one mistake. Number two, when you look at the world today. In the year 2025, of all the new power plants installed in the world, two thirds were solar power, two thirds of all, and the rest wind, I don't know coal, nuclear power, gas and everything but two thirds solar power. And today one country, China, manufactures 80% of the solar panels. Now, coming back to Europe, I can tell you that in 20, when we go back 20 years, it was Europe who started the solar story. The first subsidies are paid by Germany, Spain, Italy and others. And Europe started the solar journey. But after a while, Europe dropped the ball, China took it over. And China is today the major, solar panel manufacturer of the world. So these two mistakes cost Europe a lot. And now what do we have to do in Europe? I think we have to see that when we look at the security of energy in Europe, Europe's other. Goals, such as reaching our climate goals, but also at the same time being affordable, I see one future for Europe electrify everything as much as you can, electrify everything transportation, industry and so on. And for this, Europe needs the electricity master plan, how we are going to electrify it. And in order to do that, we have to do two things, in my view, one, grits, grits, grits is a big bottleneck there. We can talk a bit later. And the second, the pricing of electricity, how we are going to price electricity so that we can make it affordable for the consumers, for households, industry. So, the way forward is electrifying the European economy as much as we can. And at the same time enable to that we need grids, building of grids, and at the same time making the prices affordable through different tax policies and through different pricing regimes.
Minister, what's your take on this? Also, from a national perspective, how do you see as Europe dropped to that ball or Europe nowadays is being bashed, as Mr. Barroso said, too much?
I think it's crucial for every EU member state and even for European Union to understand that the most important are decision based on data, not on ideology. So I give you a short example. For example, in my country, Romania, we have installed around six gigawatts of renewables on on solar panels. We are getting one gigawatt concrete and with depreciation of between 1 and 3% in every year, in ten years we will have only 600MW and we invest more than €3 billion in that. And for example, we shouldn't make, the same pattern for every EU country for in Portugal, in Spain they you could use and this is the best way to gain energy from the solar panels in, and Norway and Sweden, of course, from another different topics and from wind. And in Romania, in this moment, I just want to look at our countries not only in perspective of the fairy tale of Dracula, which is known, but in the perspective of a country which is the leader in the region. We have natural gas or the largest gas producer in the European Union. And once we get the our energetic security of our country, will provider of security for Moldova, for Ukraine, for Hungary, from our neighbors, from Serbia and from Bulgaria. Meanwhile, if we are speaking about speed, once, you need to use 1011 years for a bureaucratic approval for hydropower plant or a nuclear power plant, once you could build it in three and four years. Definitely we have an issue inside of you. So in that perspective, I'm pretty sure that I'm ready to make that reshuffle and to start with my country, with Romania, to discuss very clear about the bureaucratisation and the cut off, all that stuff's that are blocking us to make more energy in this moment, double doubling the resource of energy now in Europe and in Romania is the only way to bring out and to bring down the prices of the energy we are paying in my country, related with the income of the people, the highest price of energy in entire European Union. We are in the same bubble with Hungary, with Bulgaria and with Greece. And you are start all together to work and to have a strong voice at Brussels level with the European Commissioner, and to start to make strong investments in grid, as Mr. President Fatih Birol said before, because we need to diversify our resources, not only in renewables. I want and we have the good alliance of Friends of Nuclear. I want to use EU resources to finance nuclear. We have a huge, history of nuclear. 25, 20 to 25% of my country production are getting from nuclear to get to hydropower plants. That's one of the best ways to to bring cheap and baseline, energy. And in that perspective, I just want to look at Romania as a country which starts to make that shift based on data, not on ideology, and making Romania a country which are not depending by the imports account, which have as much energy to use and to bring to our neighbors, will have a strong Romania, with strong Bulgaria, a strong Greece, a strong Hungary and so on will bring a strong European Union. Otherwise, if we are stuck in some ideas that everyone should put only wind or only solar panels, definitely we have an issue because.
One of the. That's one of the major aspects when we talk about, the strategic autonomy that the European Union is envisioning when it comes to sector.
It's not in my perspective, when you speak about energy, it's not about molecules or physics. It's about freedom of, people. It's about democracy. And for example, we have that Russian, blackmail, Moldova, Ukraine, starting with 2020, 2021, the entire Europe. And in this moment, daily, I receive requests from Moldova for Ukraine to help them and to support them, to don't bring in a blackout in Ukraine. So we are making that and we are making that, and we are a security provider for the region. But to have that role more, we should bring out all that bureaucratic procedures to keep it what we should keep. But we need speed. We are competing. We are in a world competing with China, which are have one of the most affordable prices of energy with Middle East side. Now we have our strategic partners from us with LNG and the vertical corridor to provide enough LNG for the entire Central and Eastern Europe to feed our industry. So in that matter should be very smart and very clear. And I'm ready to start with my with my country. I don't give a example for others. Start with Romania.
Yeah. Miss Brook, what's what's your take on this? Especially when and Minister just mentioned the speed that is needed and is not there, there. You have a different perspective of that, right. What's what's your take?
I think that although the, the topic for this conversation is if Europe can compete with clean power, I think that the question is rather the opposite. If we can compete in an economy that is based on fossil fuels. Exactly. Due to what Fatih said, that, you know, fossil fuels are much more expensive in Europe than they are in the US and China because there is simply much more domestic production in the US and China. So we are still importing 90% of the fossil fuels we are consuming in Europe, and we're doing that at a value of €400 billion every year. So I think that, you know, it's very difficult to be competitive on those premises. And at the same time, I'm very hopeful because I think we are moving in a quite high pace. And Fatih gave some good examples of how fast this transition is happening. And that is only over the last 20 years, and we are actually living in the middle of that transition. And we have been reshaping our business, but also the markets that we are active in. And, and also that reshaping in Europe has been, so far a lot around offshore wind, onshore wind, a bit of solar as well, etc. I think that we really need to leverage the strengths we have in order to do this much faster. And that's also when the benefits come, because we have seen this sort of rapid scaling of some of these technologies. And if you take offshore wind, for example, just in the last ten years, we have seen the cost go down with 25% and the output has been three fold compared to what it was before. Now we need to add also other technologies like nuclear. So even though we are one of the largest providers of offshore wind in Europe and building quite a lot of it, we are also building new nuclear. We are operating existing nuclear plants today, but we are also now into a project where we will build new nuclear in the shape and form of small modular reactors, which are not so small, by the way. They are either 300MW each or 470 megawatt each. Looking at the suppliers that we still have, and it's only by volume and scale that we can get the same kind of cost curve in that development. So we will need all the fossil free technologies that we can get our hands on. But it is important to understand that European economy can, in the long run, only be competitive if we face out the fossil fuels. And I think that we actually have really good prerequisites to do that from more than an energy perspective, because this energy is going to be used by industrial players and by households in the end. And I think we have some leading industrial players in clean tech in Europe that we can scale in order to make the demand there, because we will never be able to afford to subsidize all of this power into the market. We need to have sound businesses that can use and want to use this energy in order to build their value chains, and that can be in steel, in cement, in car manufacturing, in heavy transportation, or in other industrial areas where we actually have a lot of lighthouse projects already today. So so I'm very optimistic when it comes to not only being able to transform the energy system, but to actually be able to unlock all the business opportunities that that will provide. I think that sometimes there is a discussion around whether there is a green bubble or not, and I think it's important to say that large technological shifts or transformations, they are rarely straightforward. Of course, there will be a bit of ups and downs, but the direction is very clear and the bubble is not green, it's brown. You know, the fossil fuels will not be there in the end. So if you're looking for a bubble, that's where you need to look. I fully respect that this transition will take time and and have its challenges, but that is where we will end up. And I think to do that and scale fast enough. Then back to your origin of the question and the scaling. I think that we need to, steer away from this brown bubble and make sure that we can lead rather than lag. And three things are needed to do that. We need stable and credible policy frameworks, because that will reduce the risks for all of us investing in this business. And it will unlock capital that are willing to go in here. And I know that because we speak to the capital market basically every week, and we know what it takes in order for them to invest in our projects. Secondly, we need to remember that we are not just building assets, we are building systems. So we need to make sure we don't put all our efforts into one part of the system, only to the clean industries, or only into electricity generation or only into grids. But I agree that grids goes first right now. So so we need to make sure we have a system perspective. And lastly, we need to safeguard efficient markets because only that will provide sound business models across value chains in the end. And that's how you build prosperous competitive businesses going forward. So I think we have all the prerequisites to do that. But we need to do it.
And we need to do it faster than it is happening. Mr. Samuel, on this opening point, I want to hear your view regarding the importance of of making it faster when it comes to Europe's competitiveness and whether Europe is lagging too much, whether it dropped too much the ball or is there is still room to pick it up, you know.
Thank you. I want to bring three of my takeaways from Davos to the session. First one is the middle powers in this fragmented and polarized world, the importance of middle powers. Secondly, the power shift to east. And thirdly, we should never give up from net zero target. I mean we should not look short term. It is a long term commitment. So these are the things I want to bring to the session. While asking why I am here, I find two reasons. Maybe Turkey is a economically and integrated part of Europe. We live together, but we don't have the ring. And secondly, I'm representing Sabanci Holding, which is on both hands, both sides, both ends of the value chain. We are the largest power generator and distributor. On the other hand, we are the largest, energy consumer, the customer with our industries. And in both ends, we have reputable joint ventures with European partners like E.ON on the energy, other partners in industry. And we generate, but we also consume. So the prices, the all the market conditions are valid for us. And when I look at Turkey is one of the top three, sometimes five, largest power and gas markets, a huge market, with 85 million population. Only the power growth expectation is 3.4 until 2035. I think this is much above, much more above than European expectation. And in the meantime, we are one of the largest importers of oil and gas, a net importer from Russia, Iran and Azerbaijan through the pipelines. So this pushes us to invest more and more to our internal resources. So over the last ten years, Turkey has reached 25GW of solar and 13GW of wind. And the target for 2035 is reaching 120GW of solar and wind altogether. And this requires only for, the capacity $80 billion plus the additional transmission and great investments. The number goes up up to 120. And there we have to be pragmatic. I mean, before the session, I heard the word from Minister. I was a pragmatism. This is what we have to do in this world. I will also bring it to Europe because Turkey has speed up, the permission processes we have now, super permit process. And we are looking to efficiency both in generation and consumption. But he mentioned about prices, about affordable prices, but supply security and also the green energy so-called has also a cost. I think high prices are manageable. We can manage the high prices as long as they are predictable, because what we don't like the volatility of the prices. When I say we we as the power generators and we as the industry, because both sides have to give their decisions with predictable numbers, which means the I think there is enough capacity in Turkey as well as in Europe for more capacity. But what we need is an energy system with much more digitalized, which much more smart solutions such as storages, smart grids, demand side management. This is what we need. We have to manage the system not only by investing additional capacity. Yes, we have to be fast turkey as well as entire Europe. I see also culturally the difference also between Europe and Turkey as I feel we are more on the pragmatic side, more agile side. But the scale is important. Europe can also bring the scale. Investment is a must on the grid, on transmission. But we have to also think about efficiency through digitalization. It's like managing the traffic not only with additional roads, it's managing the traffic, solving the traffic problems with navigation systems.
You've mentioned permission processes, and this would take us to, to the issue and the aspect of regulations. Right. Which is one of the one of the most important. Can I ask you to list, like, what are some of the key regulations that you would, you would name as those that are needed to reduce the costs and scale Clean Power? Minister.
For example, Ets2 for gas. We find a way together with a few member states, France, which are using gas to bring a three year delay, for example, for entire market in my country will bring around 25% the highest price of the of the gas. So that is unaffordable for industry. And that should be started in 2026. And I think that discussion should be, put it in a very pragmatic way about the our future of the industry in Europe. And I think that is the best example for a transition fuels like coal before now we have a penalty which are doubling the price for energy made from coal in my country. So in this moment, I think that we should be very clear about gas to keep the same clear regulation and to keep it in the way that was before, and to take a delay until we take some oxygen to feed our power plants, gas to power plants and to feed our industry. And that's very clear. And meanwhile, for example, for storage, I'm a huge fan of storage because we install in Romania and we install a 200MW in storage. And now I take the money from the solar panels and I bring it to the storage. And to put a seat, you need six months in a practical way in the you could make it earlier too. But to take all the approvals we need more than one year. So in that perspective, that's very clear to have that that for investors they need very clear to know the terms, to know very well the old regulation according to you. So I think that is the most important and is in even in the yard of national countries.
What do you think regarding the regulations that are needed? Would you name as the key ones.
You know, regulation is important in order to speed up and I think there are things to be done. For example, make sure that the same things are not testing tested in several regulations. We end up with that sometimes when we want to build something that first you have to get an approval according to one regulation and then to another. And they are overlapping and looking at the same things. But you can get different results. And it also takes a long time because it's not a clear set of priorities of what actually needs to happen from a more holistic perspective. For example, when it comes to energy infrastructure related to security or other things. But but I also think it's important to say it's not just individual regulations. The most important thing is probably stable regulatory and policy frameworks that are long term, because these investments are made in order to be there for many decades. And the best thing that we can do from a European perspective is to keep an alignment between the countries so that the policy is not differing too much between countries, because you need to be able to act on a large market to sort of unlock the economics of this and then be really clear on what the targets are until, for example, 2040, and make sure we follow that trajectory, because the risk right now discussing back and forth what it's going to be or not, and are we going to sticking to to it or not. That creates uncertainty. Uncertainty is risk in the investment market. And then, you know, investors will hesitate. So I would say that clear policy frameworks that are long term is probably the most important thing. And then we need all the sort of lightning of the speed in the regulation as well.
Would you like to add to that? Because I saw you were agreeing with,
No, I was smiling because, I have a European partner operating in Turkey. But apart from this, we invest also in the United States in renewable. And I have experienced all the permission processes. Europe has the longest permission or process time from zero to build a new renewable plant in in terms of permissions, all the process, we are trying to make it faster, but we are still faster in Turkey than Europe. But in USA, I have an experience in one half year because the system, the regulation is more on awarding. I mean, when we think about the carrot and the stick, I see more motivation in us to speed up compared to Europe. This was my experience. That's why I smiled. Actually.
Mr. Bro, what do you think on that? With the regulation aspect?
We have to. We definitely need to in Europe, simplify the processes and simplification of I. I cannot argue that we should completely abolish the regulation. We should make it simpler and faster, both, the licensing and permitting. But I also want to say one more thing. We say clean energy. And I think we should agree that clean energy includes renewables, but also nuclear power. Clean energy is also for Europe, secure energy. It is for the electricity security, the because they are renewable energy is home grown. You don't I mean, if I put a solar panel on the roof of my, how should I say, my apartment, my house, my neighbor can do it as well. I am not stealing from him or her. So this is a it's a home grown. And therefore, for when we talk about energy security, I think the one of the solutions to energy security is the renewable energy together with nuclear energy. This is this is one issue. The second YMC insisting on the grids is the following. I want to give one number, which is in my view, very shocking, at least for me. Last year in Europe we have installed it was a record 80GW of renewable capacity. This is a good news. But you know what is the worst news? More than 400GW of renewable capacity was ready. But as there was no grid, we could not connect to the grid. And it didn't go to the households or the the factories. This is completely crazy. This is this is economically it doesn't make sense at all because of its lack. The talk about the, the, the, the roads and streets. It's like a you build the nicest car very fast, very nice looking, very efficient and everything, but you forget to build roads for that. So we built the power plants, but we don't have transmission lines. And this is the biggest problem today in Europe. And of course building these grids there is a the Commission has a new grids package. I hope it will see the light of the day. And this will be a D-Block. Many of the problems that we are facing, it is the main, in my view, main barrier in front of the electrification of European economy.
Thank you. Let's see if we have a few questions from the audience already. Can we have a microphone here? No. First. First madam, behind you please. Just we're going to give you the microphone. If you could wait a second, you could stand up.
My name is Tatiana San Miguel from ArcelorMittal. It's a steel manufacturing company. And I would like to address my question to all panelists to hear their different perspectives. The European electricity market is based on marginal pricing, which means the market price is set by the most expensive generator, often natural gas, as Anna referred to the electricity cost curve. We are still very much reliant on natural gas in the EU. As an energy carrier, is it possible to reduce the price of natural gas, considering the phasing out of gas may still take quite some time.
I can I can say a few things to you and one good news and one solution. Good news is nothing to do with Europe. Good news is the following. Natural gas prices are international. Natural gas prices are coming down. In last year I said we are going to see when we come here 2026 natural gas prices will come down because huge amount of LNG is coming from US, Canada, Qatar and elsewhere. And in the last year it went down by 20%. This is very good. And next year it will go down because the markets will turn from the markets of sellers to the buyers. This is a good news. But this will give a relief to the Europeans where we have we set the electricity prices based on natural gas prices, but this will not be a lasting solution. This will give a breathing space to Europeans. My in my view, there is a need to give a second look whether or not we should price our electricity based on gas prices, or we should look at some alternatives here. Maybe it is time to give a second look at this established thing.
Maybe one perspective on that, because I think the main problem is that we still have the gas in the European energy system, so the cost will be there. The question is how you take it out in the best way, if it's the market mechanism or something else. Personally, I believe that, you know, the best way of of getting that component out is to reduce the dependence on gas, because then the market will reflect reality. And I still think that market is the best mechanism of dispatching resources. And having said that, I want to make an addition because I think that the market mechanism we have is really good at dispatching the assets that we have, but it is an energy only market pricing, and it doesn't take into consideration the value that is brought to the market, for example, from nuclear, when it comes to providing the stability in the grid or taking care of the volatility or flexibility needed when you feed something into the grid. So I think that in order and it doesn't work as an investment signal in that way, because it's also short term. You have a price point somewhere between 3 to 5 years out in time, but the investments we make are 30 or 40 or 50, or in the case of nuclear, 80 years. So there is no investment signal in the market for, for anything else than energy only. And therefore we need other instruments. And I would like to give one example, because I think that the risk sharing model for nuclear that the Swedish government is now providing to us as investors and energy operators is very, very valuable because that takes into consideration both the pricing of the energy, the risk that you take, but also the value that the nuclear is bringing to the market. And that makes it possible for private market investors to invest in this project. And if I can just say one word about that, we are building a cluster of small modular reactors at a site where we already have traditional large scale reactors. And as I said before, they're not very small, but since they are smaller than than the regular ones built on a modular approach and we're building them in cluster, we are counting on also getting the price for the fleet down and be able to enable more investments in clusters like this going forward. And the fact that that risk sharing model is there is the reason we can go forward with this project. It's also the reason that we have been able to partner up with an industry consortium consisting of nine large industrial companies that have a global business, but many of them have a big business or are originating from Sweden, and they are actually now buying 20% of this project from us and investing their money into this project. And I think that's mechanism that will unlock the investments needed in the energy system. And the solution will look slightly different depending on what kind of technology or market we are talking about.
Minister.
I refer to the Central and Eastern Europe countries because in this moment we are cut off the resources from Russia, the gas from Russia. We have the largest producer of gas in the European Union, Romania. And in this moment, we are playing to figure away how we could bring more resources of gas and LNG from us through the vertical corridor in Greece, in Bulgaria, Romania and to our neighbors. And for example, once we have more liquidity in the market, definitely we will figure out how to to bring down the price, because I take a very clear example. In 1975, 70% of the energy from the world were supplied by fossil fuels, gas and oil. Today, in 2026, now we are getting 84% from fossil. So I think that market will grow and will grow and will grow. And once we have more resources, definitely we could speak about a way that to bring down the prices. I give the example in my country in 2022, we have a huge spike of the price of energy. And the government said, to to close that, that margin around €25 per, per kilowatt and per megawatt. And in this moment, we are ready to bring out that measure, because we have in the market lower prices than the cap, which are setting four years ago. So once we get more liquidity, definitely go down with prices and with diversify our, source of gas. We want to we are not more dependent only by Russian gas.
Do you want to pick up on that.
I agree with all the comments, especially in the integration of the markets in Europe is well connected and Turkey is also connected through gas and power. Yes. The merit, the merit order in the market price mechanism has been criticized also during this Covid, Covid period. And there has been some technology based cap pricing has been applied. I think, it is not about the price level only. It's about the predictability because we are also sitting on both end generating power. So we invest in power generation, but we invest in heavy industries with high energy consumption. And that we have to also calculate the cost. What we need is predictability. And it comes from the liquidity. And it comes in a in a bigger scale the prices go down. So I value that's why the importance of the integration of the markets. And definitely as a last word, I mean great is the key is the real backbone of the solution.
Let's take one more here. We have a question here from the first row. Can you wait a second please. We're going to bring you the microphone. And I'm going to ask you to stand up and introduce yourself. Please. Could you stand up please.
I am I am the bassist from NTPC India. My question is how do you see green ammonia as a source of clean power for Europe?
Could you repeat.
The ammonia?
Green ammonia okay. Yeah. Green hydrogen from there.
Yeah. Yeah okay.
As a storage. You mean.
As a source of energy?
Well, I think we will not we will not use ammonia in order to sort of enlarge the electricity system. Ammonia will, of course, be used in industrial processes or in the shipping industry. And I know that there are a lot of projects going on in relation to producing also green ammonia and of course a lot of of green electricity or fossil free electricity. Rather, I would like to, to use that word rather than green because I think nuclear is you can debate forever. That's green or not, but it's definitely fossil free. And I think we're going to need all the fossil free technologies we can get our hands on. So a lot of fossil free electricity is going to be needed to produce that ammonia. So in that way it is connected. And I think that we will for sure see a market for that. To what extent Europe will be competitive there or not compared to other parts of the world where that development is also going on? That remains to be seen, I think.
And there is a major cost issue for, at the moment. Maybe in the future the cost will come down. But there is a major cost gap for green ammonia for the time being.
And you need a huge amount of energy to produce and maybe to put in the the plant nearby to power plant. And I totally agree with Mr. Birol. We should check very clear like the hydrogen if it's economically efficient or not, or if they have the perspective to be efficient or not.
Yeah. As the co-chair of Advanced Energy Solutions, we are open to all new technologies. But this morning we have discussed about the proof of, pilots. I think the cost is the biggest challenge in front of, ammonia.
We're going to take one more question in the third row. If you could just wait the microphone, if we could have here, please, for the madam, could I ask you to stand?
Thank you so much for engaging discussion. My name is Marina, and I'm the executive director for The Lancet countdown on health and climate change. So I work at that intersection, and I wanted to suggest another dimension to this discussion that I think is often overlooked, but I find it hugely important. That is energy as a fundamental health service. Globally, we see about 3.5 million deaths that come from the burning of dirty fuels. But we've made a lot of progress in terms of reducing that mortality. Since the 1990s, we've seen, that go down. And today we've saved about 160,000 deaths every year because mostly of the face down of coal use, especially in Eastern Europe, that has made huge progress. Those benefits are never taken into account when we think about investments in the energy sector. That has a lot of economic implications in terms of huge burden of disease, particularly in Europe, with an aging population with chronic conditions. It has also implications for absenteeism, and it impacts the whole economy and the well-being pathways. So you might not have any answer to this, but I'm wondering whether you've thought of you had any discussions around how could those benefits be internalized when we make decisions about the future of energy, and how could those costs be returned to to those investments that really benefit health and sustainable development? Thank you.
So in fact, we talk about climate change, but air pollution, local pollution, a major issue definitely in Europe. But I would be not telling the truth if I say Europe is the region which suffers the most from air pollution, local pollution. In fact, India is one of the countries which suffers a lot. And in addition to that, if you ask me, what is the most important, the energy related health issue today is the primitive way of cooking in African countries. Four out of five families in Africa use wood, agricultural waste, animal waste for cooking, which in turn is a major problem for the lungs of the women and children. And this is one of the two major reasons for premature death of women in Africa. Every year, half a million women die prematurely because of this primitive way of cooking. But in Europe it is mainly coal use. In some countries. But we are, I guess, especially in Central Europe. Mr. Minister, we are finding solutions to that using different, filters, scrubbers in order to reduce the impact of it.
And that is even in the coal industry, reduce it a lot about that filters and even the gas to power. I in this moment are reaching a new power plants and you're getting only, hot air outside from from gas to power. You have a huge a very great technology for that. I check it all the numbers. And meanwhile, what I think is the problem because it's not we're not we don't have some walls in the border of Europe or in the border of our countries. If I look on some figures and numbers, I reach a reduction around 20% of CO2 emissions in, Germany and the largest economy in Europe, and the growth more than 20 times in the last 20 years of China. And somehow I think what they are making over there are affecting all of us. And meanwhile, we should compete with them in a very industrial and very competitive world market. So it's a it's a very it's a very soft balance. I think every country should use their most valuable resources and to keep a standard. But meanwhile, I don't have the luxury to lose our competitiveness in Europe. So that's why I'm a huge fan of nuclear. I'm a huge fan of pragmatism and speed because despite the fact that I'm the youngest Minister of Energy from Europe, I really believe that our generation will make a clear shift to the next generation. Of course, using renewables, but using the pragmatism and to have a very, very good legacy for next generation.
Yes, yes.
I actually would like to say that we have as a strategy to enable fossil freedom, and we are in the midst of a journey, of a massive transformation of our company, where we used to be very emission intense and where we are now clearly on the way to net zero for 2040. And I'm not going to dwell on that because that's a seminar of its own. But what I would like to say that that is not our sustainability strategy, it's our business strategy, but it is a sustainable business strategy because I'm absolutely convinced that it will cost to be an emitter in some shape or form, and we might not see the pricing effects of that in the market mechanism all the time, but it will either be there in the shape and form of emission certificates, taxes, or paying for the consequences of climate change. And having said that, we take that into consideration when we make our business cases. But we do that while still making sure that they are profitable in the business environment that we are in today, because only profitable companies can afford to do the investments needed. But the fact is that the green transition is not a sustainability thing. It's about be only. It's about being competitive. It's about defence and security and resilience. It's about environment and health and climate change, and it's about resource efficiency. And if you start to look at all of these perspectives, you can actually find the good business cases where this makes sense, both from a climate and environmental and health perspective, but also from a resource cost and business perspective. And so far we are actually doing better financially than we did when we had a much higher CO2 footprint.
Yes, please. Briefly, I'll have to.
Just one word. It's all about humanizing energy because we need energy transition for human, for their health, for their wealth, and for their skills, for their development.
Thank you very much for the speakers. Thank you for the audience. Thanks for the questions. That's we're going to think of those sessions for the next time to include them in this. Thank you very much for this.
Thank you.