If Europe is to push ahead with its low-carbon goals, it will need to expand the currently marginal involvement of Chinese companies in both the deployment and manufacture of the relevant technologies. These include solar photovoltaics, wind turbines and batteries.
Andrews-Speed, 2025, The international implications of China’s roles in the low-carbon energy transition (LSE IDEAS)
Summary
How is the EU to equip itself for a lower-carbon energy system? The collapse of battery firm Northvolt, the abandonment of the green agenda, and the Draghi report, with its doom-laden prognostications, all swirl around this question. The background: a rolling “energy crisis” that is leading to economic damage, immiseration, sickness and even deaths in households unable to afford adequate heating.
The lessons of Northvolt, according to a 2024 analysis by Tagliapietra and Trasi (Bruegel) were the need to build a “diversified ecosystem of ventures, rather than relying on champions”, “strategic partnerships with Chinese and other Asian firms” and “lower energy prices and developing skills and capital markets”. These remarks seem to have been repeated by other analysts, e.g., a more recent report by Andrews-Speed.
My own analysis reveals that Europe is making a number of meaningful investments along those lines (detailed below). However, as an example, I also calculated that 78% of funds in the ETS Innovation Fund are going to fossil fuel incumbency (ammonia, CCS, hydrogen, pyrolysis, SAF). This is against 15% to proven, scalable, alternatives, such as batteries, solar PV and wind turbines.
Mis-allocation of funds has to be accepted in all policy programs, but when such a large proportion is poured into incumbency at the project selection stage, innovation faces an uphill struggle.
Emergent policy
The focus in what follows has been subsidization relevant to R&D and manufacturing of batteries, solar PV and wind turbines. This forms a relatively smaller part of the budgetary pie but has the greatest potential. The core bureaucratic factors in my picture include (national) state aids, cohesion policy, EIB operations, Horizon Europe and the ETS Innovation Fund.
It is evident that Europe subsidizes an undeclared “portfolio” of relevant manufacturing industry that includes affiliates of multinational firms such as Sibanye-Stillwater and Imerys in mining, Bolloré in chemicals and Stellantis, Mercedes-Benz and Renault in automotive. Many specialized firms are also involved. Subsidization is a mix of new manufacturing facilities, manufacturing upgrades, and (relatively cheaper) RD&D and information exchange mechanisms such as a “competence cluster“.
Because the investments I have described are not a portfolio in the conventional sense, there is no formal mechanism to detect ownership of the firms involved. But, based on my own research, the “nationalities” include Europe, South Africa and the USA, but Asia is probably the most frequent outside Europe. If there is one split within this putative subsidization regime, it is between cooperation with Chinese (and also South Korean and Taiwanese) firms in batteries and solar photovoltaic, but not in wind turbines.
Europe’s “subsidization regime” by national origin of recipient (examples)*
| Asia | Europe | USA | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Batteries | Bluestar, Envision AESC, Sunwoda, LG, ProLogium, Geely† | ALSTOM, Atnom, Gränges Finspång, Leclanché, Olympia, Sekai, Skeleton, Schneider Electric-Renault (etc.), Stellantis-Total-Mercedes-Benz, THWAICE, Total-PSA-Opel, Valeo | Lyten††, T1 |
| Solar PV | Trina, QCells | Armor, Enel, FuturaSun, Meyer Burger, Midsummer, Mondragon | – |
| Wind turbines | – | Acciona, Norvento, Siemens Gamesa, Vestas, Windar, Windwise | Aerones, Flender¶ |
Chinese wind turbine makers are reportedly taking steps to create European manufacturing sites. However, there are also moves into the wider customs union, namely, Turkey, giving access to the European market. Perhaps such manufacturing will follow the pattern of “integrated periphery” seen in other sectors.
Atlantic-minded think tanks such as the European Council on Foreign Relations promote the idea that the EU ought to work with the USA, India and the UK to resist the Chinese wind industry, suggesting it is the “last gasp” for Europe.
The USA certainly has an insatiable urge to portray China as a threat. Over more than 20 years, the EU has also spent weighty amounts, exceeding 1.5bn Euro, financing R&D in wind turbine firms operating within its own borders. The Commission repeatedly wheeled out a stock tactic: legal commentary against, in this case, Chinese wind turbine manufacturers, on grounds they had been excessively subsidized.
Wind
EIB financing of R&D in European wind turbine firms (2004-present)
| Firm | Finance |
|---|---|
| Vestas | 725m |
| Siemens Gamesa | 690m |
| Nordex | 100m |
Logically, we ought to ask what remedy is apt in light of overarching policy goals, whether that be aligning with America, developing an independent technology policy, decarbonization, societal priorities, open innovation, cooperation with China, or some other goal.
A wind turbine manufacturing policy aligned with the USA might have upsides if the North American market expanded and European firms were given priority access to it, but it would have downsides if it turned out the Chinese devices were better, while priority access to the North American market was denied. Chinese manufacturers were traditionally “behind” in fields such as doubly-fed systems required for offshore wind farms but expertise changes rapidly.
European policy predicated on indigenous but over-priced, sub-par equipment would make the continent poorer, not richer (which unfortunately has happened in the past). The political risk for Brussels is that member states pull away from EU S&T policies (of course, no one would reject EU funds but they might not “buy” into the rest). Other S&T policies, such as closer alignment with China, are attracting the European business community.
The structure of investment
The investments I have described are not a portfolio in the conventional sense. There are obviously political, legal and staff capacity barriers to the European Commission managing them as such. This is why I am calling the policy emergent rather than intentional.
Histogram of project budgets in the ETS Innovation Fund across batteries, solar PV and wind turbines (as an example)
But when you think about it is an actual portfolio, the detail beckons. This is about thinking through how its emergent properties might play out. For example, if you plot TRL against budget and budget against time, what do you expect the lines to look like?
Focusing on the ETS Innovation Fund (again, as an example, because it is relatively easy to analyze), the Commission kindly emailed me two histograms plotting TRL on the x-axis and “Sum of Awarded EU funding” on the y-axis (in theory, the data covered the entire ETS Innovation Fund portfolio, not just renewables, although “not all the projects declare the TRL levels”). The data were anonymized so it is impossible for us to know the declared TRL of specific projects.
The first histogram was labeled “Awarded Funding by Start TRL”. The peak of funding was between TRL 6-7 and fell off on either side with no funds reported below TRL 5. The second histogram was labeled “Awarded Funding by End TRL” with the vast majority of funds allocated at TRL 9 (and none reported below TRL 7).
We might assume the histogram would tend upwards according to the idea that R&D is cheaper than manufacturing and that a “linear model of innovation” operates for the topic under consideration (at least to a tolerable degree). That is not exactly what we observe, however, at least as far as the data from the ETS Innovation Fund. But, lacking benchmarks, it is impossible to know what “the ideal” histogram ought to look like. It would seem to depend on a given mental model of how innovation ought to work, which is an unsettled, political quantity and, perhaps, therefore, worth explicit discussion.
Another factor is our inability to “objectively” determine TRL. One admittedly minority reading of the Northvolt collapse would be lack of sincere technology assessment whereby large sums were dedicated to projects on the hyped claim that they were high TRL when they, were, in fact, low TRL.
This mistake is certainly at risk of being repeated. TRL remains an important idea in EU policy rhetoric, as does inspiration from the US military-industrial complex where TRL originated, but the European bureaucracy does not seem to have systematized assessment. Rather, TRL is self-declared by project promoters.
The potential for political decisions to be “hidden” behind scientific-sounding quantities such as TRL is notably marked with projects dedicated to supporting fossil fuel incumbents which are evidently low TRL but are, instead, seen as sure wins.
While TRL offers a possible although debatable framework to resolve complications on the technical side, even if it is not being applied democratically, there is no framework at all when it comes to financing, ownership and “chain of command”.
How, therefore, can officials conceive a program that combines such a diverse mix of firms including specialists, generalists, new and old, small and large, those with track records and those without, venture capital-backed, investment bank, privately-held, publicly-listed and cooperative (i.e., Mondragon)?
One possible answer lies in the connections between investment and societal values. Human ingenuity is best obtained on the broadest possible basis. S&T policy must evoke progressive emotions about a brighter tomorrow, not misanthropy. Gender balance, political neutrality, probity and competence of senior management teams ought therefore to be vital factors in the allocation of public funds.
A subsidiary point arises as to where you want to instill competition as against cooperation, and if the latter, how you would manage rising complexity as the project scales. IP would perhaps be one of the notable issues in any such intentional program. The problem is that a world where devices like batteries are symbols of geopolitical power, and where innovations are deemed commercial and even state secrets, the space for “public interest” is limited.
One worry is that taxpayer funded R&D programs would shy away from topics that really matter due to fears over IP protection, focusing instead on peripheral issues. The prevailing atmosphere also closes down discussion of how manufacturing is changing and the progressive opportunities that lie therein.
Crowdsourced manufacturing [e.g., tank trailers] represents an emerging business model that establishes extensive connections with customer crowds and the manufacturing shop floor through a platform-based structure. This structure supports a diverse and large capability arsenal by maintaining a population of manufacturers and leveraging a crowdsourcing mechanism to extensively search for available solutions.
Gong, et al., 2025, Crowdsourced Manufacturing in Industry 4.0: Implications and Prospects, in: Systems
Stepping back, it is worth noting the history of wind turbines and solar energy, which has been both intimately tied to capitalism but often articulating progressive ideas about its reform. The latter concepts have always existed in the scientific literature (e.g. all-iron batteries and open source solar PV). This brings us to the motivations to invent which in this field suggest that some inventors believe the act of inventing will turn politics in a progressive direction.
Exactly how we could incentivize such open source “tangible goods” in a targeted sector like wind turbines – within the inevitably broader context of capitalism – is as yet unresolved. But contemporary conceptions of IP are evidently mutable social constructs that have emerged over the past few decades.
“Strategic autonomy”
“Strategic autonomy” and “sovereignty” have become dominant rhetorical goals in the European policy community including in energy policy. Advocates would deny they are talking about autarky, but the old-fashioned word serves as a convenient shorthand, while also giving us access to debates on related topics in the past, as I will discuss below.
The current, leading argument for sovereignty seems to be that the EU can buck historical trends through what often amount to relatively minor adjustments in science and industrial policy. Besides the explicit Euro-centrism of official rhetoric, policy initiatives such as the European battery and solar alliances hinge on the epistemic basis of renewal lying mainly within continental borders; as it were, an autarky of expertise as well as materials.
A political figure like Mario Draghi seems to straddle this perspective, perhaps explaining the appeal of his arguments across the political spectrum (he also positions in more straightforwardly conservative ways with his support for the military-industrial complex).
Looking at my own reading list of academic papers, “geoeconomics” experts Ban and Liu probably get to the idea most specifically, citing their paper last year “The Emperor has no batteries: Europe’s uneven bid for battery strategic autonomy”. They argue that Europe could become “a competitive supplier of decarbonisation technologies…free from Asian supply chains” but only if officials made changes in working methods termed “green developmentalism” focused on “the long haul of scaling, stabilisation, and sovereign retention [of technology]”.
Whatever else is understood from these arguments, on the one hand, they seem politically conservative, i.e., they envisage political economy more or less remaining the same (albeit with changed energy vectors); indeed, they sometimes go one step further, by suggesting the need to reverse perceived “decline” as if to turn the clock back to a time when Europe was a major manufacturing center.
That being said, in living memory, at least, Europe was never sovereign in energy. I mean this statement not just in obvious reference to sources of fossil fuels, but also a wider range of materials. North Sea oil and gas were often recovered using foreign-owned and foreign-made devices. France chose American designs for its nuclear power program (and, later, switched to imported uranium). In the rare cases when indigenous technology was attempted, as in the British nuclear power program, it was seen as a disastrous failure.*
Matters of ownership and control are indeed complicated, and we are talking about a continent. But any claims to a sovereign European energy system in the recent past look like a false memory and, were it to be created in future, it would, to a great extent, be a genuinely new development. This sense of entering uncharted territory tends to be downplayed.
There is an alternative, albeit minority, view from the left that is, to the contrary, explicit about the need for unprecedented change. It posits that such a huge program of re-equipping the energy system, to the extent of shutting down the burning of fossil fuels, could only emerge from such change. Some are minded to label this view as “pessimistic” because they take unprecedented to mean impossible. It is however not entirely spelled out why they think unprecedented technological change more plausible than unprecedented political change.
The minority argument, most prominently developed by the historian, Jean-Baptise Fressoz, goes approximately as follows (as I understood it). Autarky has been achieved in the past, to varying degrees, by dictatorial regimes such as Apartheid South Africa, but decarbonization has never been achieved (not even in small ecological communities). Therefore, based on track record, it would in theory be possible to develop an autarkic energy system, although it would be an extraordinary achievement. But it is important not to confuse that goal with decarbonization, which, in contrast, would be historically unprecedented.
The problem is not just about understanding our relationship to the past but also in space. This is because decarbonization cannot occur “in one country” but has to occur globally, as carbon emissions have global impacts seemingly regardless of where on the planet they are emitted. The energy policy literature on « trade offs » perhaps fails to grasp both the unprecedented political demands of decarbonization, as compared to other courses of action, as well as the need for global change. Fressoz therefore showed great courage recently when he defended his position on French TV in the face of powerful establishment figures such as Agnès Pannier-Runacher.
However, I believe ideas like those of Fressoz struggle to take root because they lack solid popular substrates, not just among the European population but also among the movements they seek to shape. They also re-surface unresolved questions about theories of change in the western European Green movement. For many on the left of the movement, as on the right of it, these questions produce conflicted feelings.
Historical echo
My discussion so far is a bit different from the conventional ideal of EU science and industrial policy, which was traditionally quite simplistic about the epistemic sources of renewal. Was the question primarily concerned with unleashing supposed European “genius” or was there, in fact, no “genius” to unleash?
During the Cold War, techno-nationalistic rhetoric, established above all in France and the UK with projects like the Concorde supersonic airliner, transformed into a supposedly pan-European doctrine that looked like “white supremacy with machines”. While ostensibly concerning only the NATO countries, in some notably utopian formulations, it called for collaboration with the Warsaw Pact as well. Commentators also regularly drew on right-wing “declinist” rhetoric that European supremacy was under threat (but, tellingly, not from the Soviet Union).
The picture was, in turn, mixed with less overtly emotional ingredients, like the supposedly “pragmatic” market orientation of West Germany, embodied in policies such as those of the CDU science minister Heinz Riesenhuber. (A newer complication has been Spain’s joint-venture strategies which are often now raised as solutions to the rise of China.)
Whatever the antecedents, EU policies typically took concrete form by excluding firms associated with competitors, although it was often a grey area when it came to the USA (but not with Japan). In historical cases, such as Airbus, but also substantial but less famous programs, e.g., the Joint European Sub-micron Silicon Initiative (JESSI), officials ultimately conceived a matrix of cooperative projects among firms “domiciled” in Europe.
JESSI is a success. European semiconductor companies have effectively caught up in terms of technology. JESSI has successfully catalysed the cooperation of companies and institutes in a whole range of microelectronics projects which have achieved, or are set to achieve, most of their technical goals in the areas of chipsets, design techniques, semiconductor technology and new equipment. The stage is now set to capitalise on the work of JESSI, adapting in the light of experience to convert excellent R&D results into strong market impact. But the pace at which microelectronics technology progresses necessitates ongoing efforts to maintain the achieved European position.
Assessment of JESSI PROGRAMME: European Report: Final report, European Commission, 1995
While these specific cases are rarely readable in simple terms, they seem often to have been framed, at base, by emotions, such as pride, tempered by myriad compromises, as much as any single logic. European officials might have been content merely that activities occurred across European borders, according to the over-arching narrative of European integration, even if economic effects were debatable.
Furthermore, all such frameworks were evidently established towards the end of the Cold War, concerned with “managing” economic interests among the Western bloc. The source of new ideas was at first the USA, later joined by Japan. Many older frameworks are not only dated but consigned to irrelevancy, given the Cold War finished and the Western bloc, for the moment at least, lacks the ideological potency it once had.
The supposed connections between senior government officials, “national” firms and “patriotism” that are central to techno-nationalism have long been questioned due to factors like corruption as well as the complex nature of loyalty in contemporary capitalism. A “French” firm does not necessarily act in the interests of the French people let alone higher ideals.
China
It is unclear how Europe’s accumulation of political economy would shape, and be shaped by, a country as dynamic as China but, of course, we are currently living through it. There are reasonable historical grounds to argue that China has, for a lot of history, been the primary wellspring of human ingenuity; based on this track record and assuming it could to some degree be extrapolated into the next decades, formulating effective science and industrial policy in Europe is therefore likely to require a new mindset.
If the broader context of ‘global technology ethics governance’ has changed, then the meaning of ‘China’s role’ has shifted as well. This shift is not reducible to an abstract narrative of ‘rise’; nor is it well captured by essentialist claims about civilization. What has changed more concretely is China’s position within global governance and the manner of its participation. On the one hand, China can no longer be understood simply as a passive recipient of global technological norms. On the other hand, the issue is equally one of how China’s own discourses and value frameworks come to matter within global settings. In an era defined by intensified geopolitical competition and the politicization of technology, China’s governance practices, institutional language, policy initiatives and cultural resources are increasingly entering the arena of global technology ethics debates. They are cited, questioned, misread and at times translated into new instruments of dialogue…In this respect, China’s significance in global technology governance lies not only in its institutional practices but also in the theoretical position increasingly assigned to it. From the perspective of intellectual history, the impulse among Western thinkers to ‘seek remedies in China’ is hardly new.
Lu Gao, 2026, Rethinking global technology governance at a crossroads: China’s role, historical turning points and future imaginaries, in: Cultures of Science
In this context, the “geopolitical turn in decarbonization” emanating from Western countries led by the USA is causing yet more confusion because it raises the temperature of even quite humdrum ideas. In 2020, Xi Jingping’s famous proposal on “carbon neutrality by 2060” was rejected by European leaders as grounds for cooperation, by teleconference of course, marking a notable low point on the part of the EU.
The EU high representative of that time, Josep Borrell, seemed to be moderately in favor of cooperation with China on green technology, based on public pronouncements, but he also made odd statements, comparing his idea of China to popular songs of his youth. For example, he used the term “Sinatra doctrine” for his China policies, while also citing inspiration in the “legendary song by Serge Gainsbourg, Je t’aime … moi non plus” which he took to signify “the feelings and contradictions that form part of the eternally difficult relations between couples”.
After Biden took office (2021), in keeping with the opinions of the US administration, Borrell seemingly took a more Sinophobic line. “Last week we discussed EU-China relations with EU Foreign Ministers and we agreed that there is no viable alternative to the triptych of treating simultaneously China as a partner, competitor and systemic rival, depending on the issue,” he wrote, in an op-ed bluntly entitled “How to deal with China”.
Unlike Borrell, the current high representative, Kaja Kallas, has not to my knowledge published op-eds on the website of the EEAS. Nevertheless, old mindsets still seem to dominate many aspects of European policy discussion, perhaps because they are reassuring. The Draghi report (2024), for example, has aspects of the old “techno-nationalist” vision. It is presented as if it is new while, to the contrary, actually appearing similar to many decades of policy, as if making the same moves, but perhaps at higher intensity, would solve the problem. In this regard, amnesia is the first intellectual barrier for policy analysts to overcome.
Conclusion
Returning to the work of Jean-Baptiste Fressoz, it suggests the need for unprecedented action. That action has to be global to stand any chance of working. Tied to the idea that we are living in a decolonizing world, it also has to accommodate everyone on the planet living at a decent standard of living. Once you have realized this, the scale of the challenge becomes clear.
One response would be to give up. To declare the task impossible. But as climate change is so serious that is not likely to sit well with many people. One reading is therefore of the need for an unprecedented program of green industrialism that seeks re-equip the planet with low-carbon devices such as solar panels, EV and high speed trains. This would obviously mean production at huge volume, speed and cheapness. It would be way beyond anything envisaged in the US Inflation Reduction Act and the European Green Deal
At present, only China has even got close to a model. Indeed, the USA and Europe gave up (and damage to the European green tech industry during the years of austerity cannot be reversed). There is no guarantee such a program would work, but you might think it worth a try, and appropriately, it would be led by a revolutionary party that understood capitalism would not fix the problem on its own.
During the COVID pandemic, China proposed global eradication of the virus, a humane and scientific idea. It was plausible due to the extraordinary technical and mobilization capacities of its state which, in the early stages of the crisis, could halt the virus at speeds never before seen. But it lost because the USA, unlike China, had neither the desire nor the capacity to achieve it. Crudely put, this is perhaps why Chinese leaders later dropped “zero COVID” so quickly. No one wants to relive their own defeats.
A similar dynamic potentially develops with decarbonization although, of course, in this case, decarbonization must win. While COVID was extraordinarily dangerous, it was fortunately not as catastrophic as climate change. But, as COVID also showed, forces can rapidly spiral out of rational control for all concerned.
What are the alternative proposals from Europe? In terms of minority perspectives, probably the most coherent, as an all-encompassing theory, is de-growth.
As far as I can understand this might envisage even returning European consumption to something like, say, Portugal in 1930. Extending the metaphor, it could require the entire rest of the world to be kept at even lower consumption levels akin to the Portuguese empire of that time.
Japan, Portugal, Italy and Spain [followed] a path of very low energy consumption per capita until World War II, reaching levels of between 20 and 30 GJ per capita in the 1930s. They constitute a third group, the energy consumption laggards, displaying energy use levels that [are considered] representative of the per capita consumption of pre-industrial societies
Sofia Teives Henriques and Karol J. Borowiecki, 2014, The Drivers of Long-run CO2 Emissions: A Global Perspective since 1800 (EHES Working Papers in Economic History), p. 10
How this could possibly be sustained in a decolonized world is well beyond anything we can imagine outside of a time machine. Indeed constructing a literal time machine would probably be the only way to sustain it. Remember, for this to work the whole world has to de-carbonize, not just Europe.
The idea of de-growth may imply the radical reform of capitalism. While this is perhaps possible I am not aware of any successful theory of progressive change that emerged from university academics. The list of successful Marxist revolutions is very few, none emerged from academics and none were global.
There have been many attacks on de-growth I am not proposing to join them; rather I am trying to understand the implications. To their credit, at least they proposed a global plan unlike practically no one else in Europe.
I also leave it to the experts to answer if such a huge effort would be enough to make a dent on climate change. The pattern of consumption would be lower than now but would it be low enough.
As can be seen by this hypothetical, while serious questions can be asked about the Chinese “model” it has elements of plausibility, even if it brings its own political difficulties.
Besides questions of practicality, for example, its real effect on total carbon emissions, the first of these difficulties is that the scale of the problem would have to be widely recognized.
Then a lot of cherished prejudices in Europe would have to be overcome. There would have to be a division of labor. That means gradually taking a series of loosely coordinated steps across the world based on an emerging shared understanding.
I believe this is impossible in current political conditions. The point is that the global and the European are interlocked; the interlocking is central to the story and cannot be separated and therefore, that kind of analysis might be useful in understanding the detail of what is playing out.
My analysis is provisional and I am not currently proposing to spend more time on it trying to make something coherent; the intention is to gather detailed notes with a view to improving my own awareness, not to derive conclusions such as policy recommendations, nor develop a theory of change.
On an immediate practical note, I would value a transparent approach spread mindfully over batteries, solar PV, wind turbines (and related distribution and control equipment), and which highlights the challenges of different policy settings.
It would consider what the economy and society ought to look like in a decade and then describe how that economy and society would fulfill its energy needs. This would help those trying to hold decision-makers to account. SET-Plan, the only document in existence that might gesture in such a direction, does not even get close, either in principle or practice.
It is as if the [European] Commission were incapable of working out its own relationship with history, as if it were torn between two extremes: to vindicate itself by emphasizing the past, by harking back to the pioneering days; or alternatively, to erase the memory of periods of conflict, however, recent, once and for all… Driving without a rear-view mirror.
Abélès, et al., 1993, An Anthropological Approach to the European Commission (European Commission), p. 27
Notes:
*Harvie, 1994, Fool’s Gold: the Story of North Sea Oil, p. 4; Topçu, 2010, L’agir contestataire à l’épreuve de l’atome: critique et gouvernement de la critique dans l’histoire de l’énergie nucléaire en France (1968-2008), École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, p. 61; Rush, et al., 1977, The advanced gas-cooled reactor: a case study in reactor choice, in: Energy Policy
EU energy policy between sovereignty and decarbonization
Opinions expressed on this page remain my own and should not be construed as representing the views of others, except where clearly attributed.
Dr. William Burns PhD MSc
Email: william@resorg.news
Science Think Tank 