Prime Minister announces actions to accelerate the decarbonization of French industry
In line with the 2050 carbon neutrality target enshrined in the energy-climate law in November 2019, and with the efforts undertaken within the framework of the “Fit for 55” package brought to the European level within the framework of the French Presidency of the European Union, Accelerating the fight against climate change is one of its priorities. One of its key objectives is to decarbonize industry, in order to meet its current commitment to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions in this sector by 35% between 2015 and 2030.
Jean Castex, Prime Minister, with Barbara Pompili, Minister for Ecological Transition, and Agnès Pannier-Runacher, Minister Delegate for Industry, unveil the Government’s action plan to decarbonize French industries and ensure compliance with climate commitments by reducing industrial emissions by 26 Mt/year by 2030, while sustaining employment and the industrial footprint of strategic sectors.
This ambition is embodied in the framework of France 2030, endowed with more than 50 billion euros over the period 2022-2027, including 34 billion euros in new credits, which will be invested for companies, universities, research organizations, They are fully successful in their transitions in these strategic sectors. France 2030 will devote 50% of its spending to the decarbonization of the economy, and 50% to emerging players with innovation, without adverse spending on the environment (according to the Do No Significant Harm principle).
As part of France 2030, €5.6 billion will be dedicated to decarbonizing industry and meeting climate commitments:
• €610 million to finance innovation and technology deployment for a low-carbon industry, through the launch of an Industry Decarbonization Acceleration Strategy
Initiated under the Future Investment Program (AIP), this innovation support is being implemented through the launch of four calls for projects aimed at reinventing processes and mastering future solutions, whose specifications are available on the website of ADEME, the State operator. It aims to support all research and development initiatives of industrial pilots and demonstrators that will be key to transforming the industry. Resources are also provided for the support of territorial diagnostic approaches, in order to build partnerships on industrial basins that include several major emitter sites and to identify the infrastructures that will need to be adapted.
- €5 billion under France 2030 to provide direct support for the deployment of decarbonization solutions from industrial sites, both for the most emitting sites and for the entire business fabric in all territories.
Four billion euro will be dedicated to innovative technologies such as hydrogen or carbon capture, to decarbonize the most emitting sectors, via competitive and innovative support mechanisms, built in link with the European framework. These new means in Europe will accompany an unprecedented effort to decarbonize sectors essential to strategic autonomy, such as chemistry, steel, aluminum, or building materials. In addition, €1 billion will be dedicated to mature technologies, serving all businesses in all regions.
This support from France 2030 will be developed in full consultation with all stakeholders.
Today, the Government is launching a public consultation open until 1 April 2022.
These Government investments are based on the mobilization of industrial actors, fully committed to the concrete implementation of this unprecedented effort to transform our industrial tool, to make decarbonization a lever of competitiveness.
The Strategic Sector Committee «Mining & Metallurgy» presents a «Steel Plan», elaborated with the State services, and published today, which identifies the actions to be carried out in partnership between the industrialists, the public authorities, and the trade unions, climate and environmental plans, in line with the announcements made in France 2030, but also in terms of fair trade relations and the development of employment and skills in the sector.
The ArcelorMittal Group announced on the same day that it was embarking on an unprecedented transformation of its two main French industrial sites, Fos and Dunkerque, with €1.7 billion in investment. This transformation is part of a long-term strategic partnership with the French authorities to preserve employment and strategic industrial capabilities.
These investments will transform steel production in France and achieve a total reduction of almost 40% of ArcelorMittal’s CO2 emissions in France by 2027, or 7.8 million tonnes annually. This transformation will represent a 10% reduction in industrial greenhouse gas emissions in France, or 2% of all French greenhouse gas emissions.
ArcelorMittal is already working on a second phase for its operations in France, which will use the technologies implemented in the first phase as well as CO2 capture and storage (CCS-CCU), to the extent that technology and regulation have confirmed its potential. This second phase will enable ArcelorMittal to achieve carbon neutrality in France in 2050.
Jean Castex, Prime Minister, declared: The preservation of our climate ambition and the reindustrialization of France are two major ambitions that this Government carries and that France 2030 makes possible. With massive public support and a leverage effect on private actors, we are accelerating the decarbonization of our industry, especially the steel industry, and we are providing a future for French industrial sites.”
Barbara Pompili, Minister of Ecological Transition, said: The decarbonization of industry is not only a climate imperative but also a competitiveness issue for our businesses. With France 2030, we are giving ourselves the means to accelerate this transformation, dedicating €5 billion to decarbonizing our industrial sites, and more than €600 million to developing the French offer of innovative solutions for decarbonization. I want to salute the quality of the partnership with ArcelorMittal, which alone will allow us to reduce our industrial emissions by nearly 10%. The approach taken in the steel sector is exemplary of the one we want to deploy across all sectors of the economy, as part of a form of ecological planning that is essential to achieving our climate objectives.”
Bruno Le Maire, Minister of Economy, Finance and Recovery, said: France 2030 dedicates €5 billion to decarbonizing our industrial fabric, in all territories, on a scale unprecedented in Europe, to make our climate responsibility an asset of competitiveness. With the steel industry, a key sector for our strategic autonomy but also one of the sectors that today emit the most CO2, we are launching an unprecedented partnership to build together the low-carbon industry of tomorrow. At the Dunkirk site and the Fos site, we are investing massively together to reduce by 2027 nearly 10% of France’s industrial emissions.”
Agnès Pannier-Runacher, Deputy Minister of Industry, said: It is on this site in Dunkirk, one of the five most CO2-emitting sites in France and one of the largest steel production sites in Europe, that we announce the industrial decarbonization component of the France 2030 plan. Today we reaffirm the industrial vocation of our country, a vocation that is one with our climate responsibility. Producing in France almost always reduces our carbon footprint. 60 years after the first blast furnace was fired, Dunkerque is building its future by combining the fight against global warming, industry and French jobs.”
ABOUT FRANCE 2030
The France 2030 investment plan:
• Reflects a twofold ambition: to sustainably transform key sectors of the economy (energy, hydrogen, automotive, aeronautics or space) through technological innovation and industrialization, and to position France not only as an actor, but as the leader of tomorrow’s world. From basic research, to the emergence of an idea to the production of a new product or service, France 2030 supports the entire life cycle of innovation up to its industrialization;
• It is unprecedented in its size: in total, it is more than 50 billion euros, including 34 billion euros in new credits, that will be invested for companies, universities, research organizations, They are fully successful in their transitions in these strategic sectors. The challenge is to enable them to respond competitively to the ecological and attractiveness challenges of the coming world, and to bring out the future champions of our fields of excellence;
• Will be implemented collectively: thought in consultation with economic, academic, local and European actors to determine the strategic orientations. Project managers are invited to submit their application via an open, demanding and selective procedure to benefit from the State’s support, in the continuity of the Future Investment Programs and the France Recovery Plan;
• Is led by the General Secretariat for Investment on behalf of the Prime Minister.
