#DecarbonizingEurope by 2050 - EU energy players propose one broad ambitious mission for Europe

In a bid to shape one of Europe’s future grand challenges within the European Commission’s new framework programme Horizon Europe, a coalition gathering the most important energy players in Europe covering the electricity, heat and gas sector are proposing a broad challenge to Europe: Let’s aim at decarbonizing Europe by 2050.

The European Commission’s Horizon Europe programme will now include mission-oriented goals - a form of time-limited and objective-focused research, envisaged as wide-ranging funding instruments that aim to meet the global challenges of our time. The Commission is scheduled to unveil its proposed mission themes to member states on 15 October.

With this date in mind, the European Technology and Innovation Platform for Smart Networks in Energy Transition (ETIP SNET) – a unique co-operation between key energy sector players to foster a European energy transition in line with the Paris agreement targets; propose their mission orientated goal for Europe:

“A secure, efficient and digitalized European energy system, fully decarbonized by 2050, coupling all energy sectors.”

As reiterated in the IPCC global warming report released earlier this week, limiting global warming is an urgent global challenge. ETIP SNET sees the Commission’s mission-oriented goals as an ideal opportunity to prioritise research in Europe to address this challenge. Speaking about the proposed mission, ETIP SNET Chairman Nikos Hatziargyriou said: “Fully decarbonizing Europe by 2050 is a very ambitious target, but ETIP SNET has never lacked ambition. We think that such a climate change mission deserves a prominent place within the Commission’s new framework programme as it affects all European citizens, industry and beyond.”

ETIP SNET guides European R&I activities in the area of Smart Energy Networks. This covers areas such as energy systems management, storage and interface between power, gas, heat or transport networks, flexible generation, digitalisation of the energy systems, and energy customer involvement. The proposed mission orientated objective is integral to the platforms overall goal, as outlined in the recently launched report Vision 2050, to have a:

A low-carbon, secure, reliable, resilient, accessible, cost-efficient, and market-based pan-European integrated energy system supplying the entire society and paving the way for a fully carbon-neutral circular economy by the year 2050, while maintaining and extending global industrial leadership in energy systems during the energy transition.

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More about the ETIP SNET

Since 2016, the key energy system players in Europe, represented through their EU associations, platforms and national stakeholders, started a strong and unique co-operation under the umbrella of ETIP SNET - The European Technology and Innovation Platform Smart Networks for Energy Transition. Its role is to guide research, development and innovation to support Europe's energy transition with innovation for the transmission and distribution systems. These systems form the technical and market platforms where clean electricity generation, empowered customers, storage technologies, smarter grids and interfaces to gas, heat and transport networks make the energy transition happen in secure and affordable ways.

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