Electrification: Europe’s forgotten industry decarbonisation option

Having spent years for focus on hydrogen, policymakers should switch their attention to direct electrification, which could deliver 90% of industrial process heat by 2035, argues a new study by the think-tank Agora Industry, released today (5 June).

“There is a strong case to promote its use and create the right incentives to encourage its adoption,” explains Frank Peter, the director of the ancillary group founded in 2021 to supplement the work of Agora Energiewende. 

Their report identifies existing, and up-and-coming technologies which could meet 90% of process heat demand in the EU by 2035. This would clean up two-thirds of the EU’s industrial emissions, which currently account for circa 20% of Europe’s overall greenhouse gas emissions.

These technologies range from large heat pumps providing temperatures up to 200 °C – food and paper industries are beginning to adopt to – while newer plasma torches provide heat of up to 5000 °C. 

The think-tank argues that hydrogen receives many EU subsidies via the Hydrogen Bank and the Important Projects of Common European Interest (IPCEI) scheme, while direct electrification of industry has been neglected.

“We are asking that [policymakers] put the same focus and support in place for direct electric solutions as we do for hydrogen, to have it on an equal footing,” Peter told a group of journalists.

After all, “we see that hydrogen solutions come with their own challenges,” he explains, noting that the cost of hydrogen, “green and blue” is much higher than “what was expected some three to five years ago.” Highlighting  the “slow uptake” of hydrogen in Europe.

EU industrial electrification plan

To fix the support mismatch, the next European Commission should present an “industrial electrification plan” to remove some of the barriers they identified.

This will entail an “industrial alliance” since “in many smaller companies, there is a lack of awareness that direct electric solutions exist,” said Peter.

But the plan would mean potentially changing some EU laws like the renewable energy directive (RED), last overhauled in 2023, to set “deployment targets” for direct electrification.

In theory, the current RED framework mandates that 42% of hydrogen used by industry should be mostly ‘renewable’. The target is so far out of reach – hydrogen’s current share is 0.2% – that opening the law to electrification could prove tempting for lawmakers in the next term.

“We should definitely think whether we need a specific target for the use of direct electricity,” says Peter, adding that “this could then be translated into policy schemes like the renewable energy directive.”

Beyond targets, funding schemes to “explicitly support direct electrification” are also needed, the think-tank argues.

And then there’s the grid question – the challenge of increasing Europe’s power grids was a key reason why policymakers chose hydrogen over direct electrification to begin with. 

Regulators – who are obliged to plan very conservatively – must be empowered “to integrate strong industrial electrification” in grid planning and manufacturing should be given “easy grid access”. 

This echoes calls from the grid association Eurelectric, which has been pushing for more flexibility in operators’ ability to plan grids. The looser rules would allow grid operators to invest in infrastructure before it is needed – risking the financing of unused or under-used ‘ghost pylons.’

[Edited by Donagh Cagney/Rajnish Singh]

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