Environmental legislation

The European Geothermal Energy Council (EGEC) welcomes the European Commission’s initiative to review the Climate and Environmental Delegated Acts of the EU Taxonomy legislation. We strongly support the objectives of simplification, reduction of administrative burden, and alignment of Taxonomy with the EU’s industrial and climate ambitions. In this context, and with the intention of contributing to a more coherent and technology-neutral sustainable finance framework, we wish to suggest the following modifications. Remove the emission threshold and mandatory LCA requirements for geothermal technologies Create a coherent taxonomy category for geothermal heat pumps Clarify the scope of the “Manufacturing of renewable energy technologies” category Address practical challenges in DNSH criteria for DHC networks   EGEC Response to the Call for Feedback on EU Taxonomy – Review of Climate and Environmental Delegated Acts (PDF)  

The European Commission ‘Competitiveness Compass’ released on Wednesday  29 January sent the right signal for the Clean Industrial Deal.  EGEC supports the initiatives set out for ensuring a competitive energy for people and business.  To supply affordable energy, more competition is required on energy markets to supply electricity, heating and cooling, and for storage. 

Over 200 stakeholders across the value chain of the geothermal sector, government agencies, municipalities, consumers, academia, researchers, think-tanks and civil society called on the European Commission to prepare a European geothermal energy strategy and action plan.  

EGEC welcomes the opportunity to contribute to the Commission’s guidelines on designating renewables acceleration areas (RAAs) and highlight the following: Need for a fair evaluation of geothermal-based electricity A higher use of non-price criteria is needed Need for renewable energy auctions by technology Read the full EGEC Response. See EGEC factsheet on Auctions to deploy geothermal.

EGEC welcomes the Commission's effort to assess the state of public funding and the capacity of EU countries to increase the uptake of private investment in energy efficiency. We firmly believe that geothermal energy can give a great contribution towards this objective.

EGEC welcomes the Commission effort to provide guidance to Member States and market actors on how to unlock private investment, notably by developing innovative financing tools, scaling up financial instruments and making the most of public budget support.

EGEC views on the EU Critical Raw Materials Act   EGEC, the voice of the European geothermal industry, is a not-for-profit association representing the entire value-chain of the industry across 28 countries. It is included on the European Transparency Register number: 11458103335-07. Further information can be found at www.egec.org.

In a bid to accelerate renewable energy deployment, the European Commission is looking at means to accelerate permitting processes.

EGEC invites all geothermal stakeholders to take part in the two consultations below on EIA and licensing.

The integration of circularity into geothermal energy production indicates that all its components and products need to be optimised, re-used, repaired, redistributed, refurbished, and/or remanufactured. Circularity is the cornerstone of a sustainable future, where geothermal and other renewable sources have a crucial role to play.