Ceramics, the Italian industry to Europe: risk of crisis without urgent action

Italian ceramic industry on mission in Europe. On 2 and 3 December, the top management of Confindustria Ceramica, together with representatives of major companies in the sector, will be in Brussels for a series of meetings with representatives of European institutions and Commission Vice-President Raffaele Fitto. The aim is to explain that the Italian ceramic industry - a hard-to-abate, highly energy-intensive and strongly export-oriented sector - risks a systemic crisis within a few years if urgent and targeted action is not taken.

The sector today has 248 companies, 26 thousand direct employees (40 thousand with allied industries) and over EUR 6.3 billion in exports. However, its resilience, the companies point out, is threatened: the current configuration of climate policies, together with the explosion of costs linked to the European ETS system of carbon credit trading, is rapidly eroding the competitiveness, investment capacity and employment prospects of the entire sector. Without an immediate revision of European standards, deadlines and instruments, the risk is the gradual closure of European plants and the relocation of production to non-EU countries lacking comparable environmental and social standards, denounces the Italian industry.

Augusto Ciarrocchi, president of Confindustria Ceramica, emphasises: 'Our sector is a world leader in efficiency and emission reduction thanks to investments of 4.3 billion euros over the last decade. But today we are facing a breaking point: the absence of realistic technological alternatives and the uncontrolled dynamics of Ets costs risk wiping out what we have built in a very short time. The Ets system has become a de facto carbon tax that stifles our ability to invest: in just one year, investment in the sector fell by 20%, a drop of EUR 80 million equivalent to the Ets costs paid by our companies, jeopardising competitiveness and jobs. Without immediate corrective measures, Europe will end up rewarding those who pollute outside its borders and penalising those who, like us, really invest in the environment'.

"We are at the side of our companies to reverse the course of the crazy European decarbonisation policies that risk deindustrialising the continent," added Aurelio Regina, Confindustria's delegate for Energy, who accompanied the delegation. "The European Union, which contributes 6% of total global emissions, has imposed - he continued - a cost of CO2 up to six times higher than all areas of the world where CO2 is priced, always considering that only 25% of the planet's areas have a system of pricing climate-changing emissions. European industry is responsible for 1.5% of emissions: even if we were to eliminate them all tomorrow, the effect would be imperceptible in terms of climate, but the impact would be devastating for our economic and social resilience and our welfare system. Compared to twenty years ago, when the ETS mechanism was introduced, the price of gas has more than doubled, so imposing even an additional CO2 tax today would only disadvantage European production and increase energy costs. Today's gas price already contains a market signal to push investments in the direction of decarbonisation. What is needed is a sense of responsibility and pragmatism on the part of the European institutions, which must immediately suspend the Ets system until at least 2030, profoundly reviewing its modes of operation, through the exclusion of thermoelectric production and the inclusion of instruments capable of reducing CO2 costs".

"These days in Brussels we are bringing the voice of an entire industrial district, the ceramics district, which represents excellence not only in Emilia-Romagna, but also in Europe," points out the president of the Emilia-Romagna region, Michele De Pascale, who is also present together with the representatives of Italian ceramics. "In Emilia-Romagna we can count on companies that are among the most evolved in the world, with modern, digitalised, highly efficient and sustainable plants,' he pointed out. Penalising them through a disproportionate regulatory system, starting with the ETS mechanism, means making those who first and responsibly did their part lose competitiveness, and at the same time favouring non-EU producers such as China, India or Turkey, countries where environmental and social constraints are far fewer.