On July 17th, the European Commission published its Electrification Action Plan which aims at making Europe the first electro-powered continent and sets an indicative target of 46% electrification by 2040. This target will be subject to an impact assessment as part of the post-2030 Energy Union Package planned for Q4 2026.
The Plan addresses current barriers to further electrification such as the price difference between gas and electricity, the time needed to connect to the grid and the difficulties of innovative technologies to reach commercial scale. The Plan especially outlines actions to electrify the transport, buildings and industry sectors.
Some of the relevant actions include:
- Price: The Commission will include a provision on the tax differential between electricity and gas as part of the upcoming legislative proposal on network charges. Furthermore, as part of the post-2030 Energy Union Package, measures will be proposed to progressively phase out fossil fuel subsidies
- ETS: the ETS Directive proposal of July 17th includes the establishment of an EUR 100 billion Industrial Decarbonisation Bank and an EUR 30 billion ETS Investment Booster. These mechanisms can support investments in industrial electrification, grid connection infrastructure, on-site energy management systems and battery or thermal storage. The calls will be launched immediately after the adoption of the revised ETS directive
- OPS and infrastructure: although not directly connecting this to a proposed action, the Plan notes that non-discriminatory pricing of OPS services is a prerequisite to support the electrification of ports. To that end, the Commission invites relevant stakeholders such as those represented within the European Sustainable Shipping Forum to develop best practices.
The same applies to the designation of ports as “industrial acceleration areas” in line with the proposed Industrial Accelerator Act which should facilitate permitting. Furthermore, Action 10 sets a KPI for the deployment of sufficient port grid capacity and shore-side charging infrastructure by 2040 to enable battery-electric propulsion for one third of the EU ferry fleet.
FEPORT will closely follow the implementation of the Electrification Action Plan, especially where it touches on topics of relevance to the sector such as permitting, OPS deployment and the electrification of hinterland transport modes, or the availability of funding to support port electrification.
