Accelerating investment for an energy-independent and low-carbon future
For the second time this decade, Europe is facing a sharp surge in fossil fuel prices. Fatih Birol, IEA executive director, has described the current crisis as ‘the greatest threat to global energy security in history’. Once again, soaring oil prices are squeezing households’ purchasing power, undermining industrial competitiveness, and exposing the EU’s structural dependence on imported fossil-fuel energy. In this context, accelerating investment in the low-carbon transition is no longer solely an environmental imperative, it is a strategic economic necessity.
I4CE’s latest edition of the State of Europe’s climate investment shows that Europe is moving forward, but not fast enough. After a sharp increase following the 2022 energy crisis, investment in the low-carbon transition has stagnated. It reached 534 billion euros in 2025, well below the 878 billion euros needed annually to meet the EU’s 2030 targets. Unmet investment needs do not disappear. They pile up, widening the gap and increasing the cost to reach climate neutrality for future generations. Early signals in 2026 suggest that the new energy crisis could once again push investment upward. Sustaining the tendency will require robust long-term planning.
Europe cannot afford another cycle of crisis-driven investment surges followed by years of stagnation. The current situation calls for both immediate measures to protect households and businesses from rising energy prices, but also for structural initiatives to mitigate the impact of future crises. The EU and its Member States have concrete tools at their disposal: pursuing and resourcing electrification plans at the EU level and nationally, prioritising the clean transition in the next multiannual EU budget,, maintaining the ambitions of the CO2 emissions standards for cars and vans regulation, and ensuring that the forthcoming revision of the EU emission trading system increases investment in industrial decarbonisation.
Above all, these policy levers must provide investors, businesses, and citizens with the clear, stable, long-term signals they need to commit to an energy independent and low carbon future for Europe.
