Despite rising concerns about fossil fuels and a global push towards cleaner energy, the EU is currently at risk of continuing its dependency of fossil fuel for another 50 years. This risk has come from lobbying done by the gas industry for a new infrastructure.
The Corporate Europe Observatory claims that a number of gas firms poured over £88 million into their efforts to lobby EU decision makes last year. These funds were spent employing over a thousand professional lobbyists to back their campaign which promotes gas as a ‘bridge fuel’ that is clean and capable of assisting the European transition over to renewables.
Over the last three years, this lobbying has given gas firms the chance to sit down with top dogs of the EU’s climate and energy departments. The Corporate Europe Observatory claims that there has been over 460 of these meetings.
The Observatory goes on to explain that as a result of these meetings, the EU and its member states have encouraged a range of new gas infrastructure projects, which have been identified as controversial. These projects include the Euro-Caspian Mega-Pipeline and the Franco-Spanish MidCat Pipeline.
Belén Balanyá, the Climate Policy Campaigner at the Corporate Europe Observatory is sceptical of the claim made by the gas lobbyists with regards to gas being a clean source of energy. She said: “As a result of intense industry lobbying, the EU Commission has swallowed the gas lobby’s false claim that their fuel is a ‘clean’ complement to renewables and is now planning a new generation of pipelines and other gas infrastructure on this basis.”
