Europese staalindustrie luidt de noodklok
Hoe lang moet die gekkigheid nog doorgaan voordat het beleid bij zinnen komt?
Onder de titel, 'Steel lobby Eurofer urges EU to review energy, climate policy', schreef Maytaal Angel voor Reuters:
Europe needs to urgently review costly energy and climate policies if it wants EU steelmaking to have a future, steel industry lobby Eurofer said on Tuesday.
Eurofer made the comments ahead of a Dec. 4 meeting of European regulators, lawmakers and top steelmakers to discuss measures to preserve the sector's global competitiveness, known as the "steel action plan".
"First efforts to improve the business environment for industry in Europe are now being studied by the Commission. However, the real emergency is the climate and energy policy in Europe," Eurofer Director General Gordan Moffat said in a statement.
Moffat said cumulative regulatory costs for EU steelmakers account for up to 30 percent of profits in "normal good years" and from 30 to over 100 percent of profits in the economic crisis years of 2009-2011.
The European Commission launched the steel action plan in June in a bid to stem a decline in Europe's steel industry, hit by a roughly 30 percent drop in demand since 2008 that has led to plant closures.
The plan aimed to cut red tape, boost innovation, create a level international playing field and study ways to lessen the burden of energy costs, which account for about 40 percent of steelmakers' operating expenses.
The Commission is also preparing an EU summit next year focussed on industry. Industry Commissioner Antonio Tajani has warned that the continent faces an industrial decline unless it addresses high energy costs.
"The energy price differential between Europe and its competitors is unsustainable, yet little or nothing appears to be being done to find a solution. Energy-intensive industries are already leaving Europe," Moffat said.
EU industrial output has fallen to 15.1 percent of GDP from 15.5 percent last year, short of an informal goal of 20 percent by 2020, the Commission said previously in a report on industrial competitiveness.
Lees verder hier.
De schade van de Tweede Wereldoorlog wordt op 2 3 biljoen dollar geraamd (één biljoen = duizend miljard. Pas op! In het Engels wordt ons biljoen 'trillion' genoemd). Bjørn Lomborg schatte de kosten van de het Europese klimaatbeleid tot 2100 onlangs op meer dan 20 biljoen dollar. Dat is 7 10 maal zo veel!
Lomborg:
The EU is committed to cutting carbon emissions by 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. This will cost, according to an averaging of all the available energy-economics models, $250 billion a year. By the end of the century - after a total cost of more than $20 trillion - this will reduce the projected temperature increase by a mere 0.05C.
Hoeveel welvaart moet er nog worden vernietigd, hoeveel bedrijven moeten er nog failliet gaan en/of wegtrekken naar andere oorden, en hoeveel miljoenen werklozen moeten er nog bij komen voordat de EU het roer omgooit en het decarboniseringsbeleid op de schroothoop van de geschiedenis deponeert?
De politiek blijft hardnekkig in het opwarmingssprookje geloven en sluit haar ogen voor nuchtere kosten/batenanalyse van het klimaatbeleid. Hoe lang nog?
Voor mijn eerdere DDSbijdragen zie hier.
