On behalf of Glass Alliance Europe, Bertrand Cazes at the meeting on Energy Intensive Industries convened by the European Commission expressed the support from the glass industry to the proposal that the high-level group starts elaborating an Industrial Transformation Masterplan for the implementation of the energy-intensive industries’ transition towards a climate-neutral and circular economy. This masterplan should indicate the main short- and long-term actions required from industrial value chains and the relevant enabling framework at the European and Member State levels. It should identify concrete areas and large-scale investment cases requiring R&I and investment and inform national energy and climate plans.
While laying out the glass industry support to the proposal, Bertrand Cazes emphasised the important role of Europe’s glass industries as enablers of a carbon-neutral Europe thanks to its products, such as energy-efficient glazing or lightweight reinforcement fibres. He went on stressing the need for supportive framework conditions for further decarbonisation of the glass manufacturing processes, including financial support to R&D and demonstration projects for the electrification of large-scale high-temperature glass furnaces. Challenges linked to the availability and affordability of clean energy, including biogas, the conditions for the deployment of CCS and CCU technologies as well as the necessity to safeguard Europe’s industrial competitiveness in this transition were also highlighted.