The research road to net-zero industry

The European Green Deal is arguably the biggest ambition of the current European Commission and EU leaders agree on the need to accelerate Europe’s transition to a net-zero industry. While the EU agreed to invest part of its 1.8 trillion budget euros into accelerating the transition to a more sustainable economy, it needs to get better and faster at moving tech ideas towards the marketplace. Several related questions arise, among which: How Europe’s climate policies and tools can help set the right research and investment priorities to help make it happen? What are the key priorities for climate-related research in the short and medium terms, and how can EU funding support and leverage the success of green tech incubators, entrepreneurs and international cooperation? What is the responsibility of large corporations in the process? And how can Europe reposition value chains to obtain the resources it lacks while avoiding the creation of new dependencies?

On 18 and 19 September, Science|Business will gather experts from industry, research and policy to assess the state of play in the implementation of key aspects of the plan, especially the Net-Zero Industry Act, as well as the research needed to make it happen and other challenges ahead.