Constructive reposted this
To lead or not to lead? 🤔 A crucial question and the title of Cleantech for Europe's excellent annual summit in Brussels this week, gathering senior leaders from industry, investment, and European politics. As Julia Reinaud said in her opening speech: It's not a climate question, it's a sovereignty question. We need to use capital strategically for outcomes, not processes. Execution is the name of the game: de-risk, deploy, build. 👷🏻♀️ Also: Christmas came early this year when I had the opportunity to meet Jigar Shah at a geothermal lunch organized by the impressive team at Constructive ahead of the summit. As Director of the Loan Programs Office in the U.S. during the Biden administration, he oversaw the financing of clean technologies, streamlining processes and lowering the threshold for companies to access funding. ⭐️ This is where Europe has a lot to learn. The Financial Times recently reported that of the €7.1bn awarded from the EU's flagship innovation programme for clean tech, only 5% has been paid out. Why? Because it can take up to 3,000 hours and an average of €85,000 just to apply. 😳 During the Summit, I had the privilege to co-host a breakout session on geothermal energy with Martin Hojsik, Vice President of the European Parliament, moderated by the insightful Michael O'Connor and with great contributions from GA Drilling's Igor Kocis and others. When summarizing the session in a panel I quoted Jigar Shah: "Europe needs to stop telling itself what it can't do and start to be confident of what it CAN do." For geothermal that means: 🔸 We already have all the pieces of a budding geothermal industry in Europe, and we are well positioned to lead. 🔸 We simply need to look at what countries like Iceland and Türkiye have already done and repeat it: 🔹 Clear revenue-supporting incentives like FITs or CfDs 🔹 Financial instruments to de-risk early exploration and drilling 🔹 An EU-level framework to share geological data and streamline permitting Preferably as part of the upcoming Geothermal Action Plan. Or, like Martin Hojsík so brilliantly put it: Drill, Europe, drill! ♨️ #energy #renewableenergy #geothermal