Europe’s chemical industry has reached a breaking point. The warning lights are no longer blinking — they are blazing. Unless Europe changes course immediately, we risk watching an entire industrial backbone, with the countless jobs it supports, slowly hollow out before our eyes. Consider the energy situation: this year European gas prices have stood at 2.9 times higher than in the United States. What began as a temporary shock is now a structural disadvantage. High energy costs are becoming Europe’s new normal, with no sign of relief. This is not sustainable for an energy-intensive sector that competes globally every day. Without effective infrastructure and targeted energy-cost relief — including direct support, tax credits and compensation for indirect costs from the EU Emissions Trading System (ETS) — we are effectively asking European companies and their workers to compete with their hands tied behind their backs. > Unless Europe changes course immediately, we risk watching an entire > industrial backbone, with the countless jobs it supports, slowly hollow out > before our eyes. The impact is already visible. This year, EU27 chemical production fell by a further 2.5 percent, and the sector is now operating 9.5 percent below pre-crisis capacity. These are not just numbers, they are factories scaling down, investments postponed and skilled workers leaving sites. This is what industrial decline looks like in real time. We are losing track of the number of closures and job losses across Europe, and this is accelerating at an alarming pace. And the world is not standing still. In the first eight months of 2025, EU27 chemicals exports dropped by €3.5 billion, while imports rose by €3.2 billion. The volume trends mirror this: exports are down, imports are up. Our trade surplus shrank to €25 billion, losing €6.6 billion in just one year. Meanwhile, global distortions are intensifying. Imports, especially from China, continue to increase, and new tariff policies from the United States are likely to divert even more products toward Europe, while making EU exports less competitive. Yet again, in 2025, most EU trade defense cases involved chemical products. In this challenging environment, EU trade policy needs to step up: we need fast, decisive action against unfair practices to protect European production against international trade distortions. And we need more free trade agreements to access growth market and secure input materials. “Open but not naïve” must become more than a slogan. It must shape policy. > Our producers comply with the strictest safety and environmental standards in > the world. Yet resource-constrained authorities cannot ensure that imported > products meet those same standards. Europe is also struggling to enforce its own rules at the borders and online. Our producers comply with the strictest safety and environmental standards in the world. Yet resource-constrained authorities cannot ensure that imported products meet those same standards. This weak enforcement undermines competitiveness and safety, while allowing products that would fail EU scrutiny to enter the single market unchecked. If Europe wants global leadership on climate, biodiversity and international chemicals management, credibility starts at home. Regulatory uncertainty adds to the pressure. The Chemical Industry Action Plan recognizes what industry has long stressed: clarity, coherence and predictability are essential for investment. Clear, harmonized rules are not a luxury — they are prerequisites for maintaining any industrial presence in Europe. This is where REACH must be seen for what it is: the world’s most comprehensive piece of legislation governing chemicals. Yet the real issues lie in implementation. We therefore call on policymakers to focus on smarter, more efficient implementation without reopening the legal text. Industry is facing too many headwinds already. Simplification can be achieved without weakening standards, but this requires a clear political choice. We call on European policymakers to restore the investment and profitability of our industry for Europe. Only then will the transition to climate neutrality, circularity, and safe and sustainable chemicals be possible, while keeping our industrial base in Europe. > Our industry is an enabler of the transition to a climate-neutral and circular > future, but we need support for technologies that will define that future. In this context, the ETS must urgently evolve. With enabling conditions still missing, like a market for low-carbon products, energy and carbon infrastructures, access to cost-competitive low-carbon energy sources, ETS costs risk incentivizing closures rather than investment in decarbonization. This may reduce emissions inside the EU, but it does not decarbonize European consumption because production shifts abroad. This is what is known as carbon leakage, and this is not how EU climate policy intends to reach climate neutrality. The system needs urgent repair to avoid serious consequences for Europe’s industrial fabric and strategic autonomy, with no climate benefit. These shortcomings must be addressed well before 2030, including a way to neutralize ETS costs while industry works toward decarbonization. Our industry is an enabler of the transition to a climate-neutral and circular future, but we need support for technologies that will define that future. Europe must ensure that chemical recycling, carbon capture and utilization, and bio-based feedstocks are not only invented here, but also fully scaled here. Complex permitting, fragmented rules and insufficient funding are slowing us down while other regions race ahead. Decarbonization cannot be built on imported technology — it must be built on a strong EU industrial presence. Critically, we must stimulate markets for sustainable products that come with an unavoidable ‘green premium’. If Europe wants low-carbon and circular materials, then fiscal, financial and regulatory policy recipes must support their uptake — with minimum recycled or bio-based content, new value chain mobilizing schemes and the right dose of ‘European preference’. If we create these markets but fail to ensure that European producers capture a fair share, we will simply create new opportunities for imports rather than European jobs. > If Europe wants a strong, innovative resilient chemical industry in 2030 and > beyond, the decisions must be made today. The window is closing fast. The Critical Chemicals Alliance offers a path forward. Its primary goal will be to tackle key issues facing the chemical sector, such as risks of closures and trade challenges, and to support modernization and investments in critical productions. It will ultimately enable the chemical industry to remain resilient in the face of geopolitical threats, reinforcing Europe’s strategic autonomy. But let us be honest: time is no longer on our side. Europe’s chemical industry is the foundation of countless supply chains — from clean energy to semiconductors, from health to mobility. If we allow this foundation to erode, every other strategic ambition becomes more fragile. If you weren’t already alarmed — you should be. This is a wake-up call. Not for tomorrow, for now. Energy support, enforceable rules, smart regulation, strategic trade policies and demand-driven sustainability are not optional. They are the conditions for survival. If Europe wants a strong, innovative resilient chemical industry in 2030 and beyond, the decisions must be made today. The window is closing fast. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Disclaimer POLITICAL ADVERTISEMENT * The sponsor is CEFIC- The European Chemical Industry Council  * The ultimate controlling entity is CEFIC- The European Chemical Industry Council  More information here.

BRUSSELS — The European Commission is dialing reform, but not everyone is picking up. Following years of talks, Brussels is almost ready to drop a long-awaited telecommunication blueprint designed to upgrade networks and support the industry. The Digital Networks Act, expected to land Dec. 16, will overhaul the current rulebook to make it easier for operators to roll out 5G and fiber, and boost investment in Europe’s digital infrastructure. But it’s likely to upset players from national governments to tech firms in the process. The continent’s biggest telecom companies have long argued that stifling rules and a fragmented single market make it hard for them to scale and earn sustainable profits — and take European networks to the next level. “Never has connectivity been so important to the life of people” but “at the same time, our industry has trouble in many regions to achieve a decent return on capital,” said Vivek Badrinath, the boss of global mobile association GSMA. But not everyone is buying the crisis pitch — here are the battle lines ahead of the proposal. BIG TELCOS VS. BIG TECH Years of lobbying by Europe’s top telcos to have data-hungry platforms such as TikTok, Netflix and Google’s YouTube help foot the bill for network expansion seem to have paid off. The Commission is now weighing how to tackle “challenges in the cooperation” between tech and telecom players in its reforms. One of the options on the table is turning into a political minefield: Empowering regulators to settle potential disputes between the two groups over how they handle traffic. Opponents of regulatory intervention fear that it will give operators a way to pressure content providers for payments, akin to the unpopular proposal known as “fair share” that was floated under the last Commission. At worst, they say, it could even upend the internet as we know it by undermining net neutrality — the principle that service providers need to treat all traffic equally, without throttling or censoring. “This would have immediate and far-reaching consequences, harming European consumers, businesses, digital rights and the sustainability of the creative and cultural sectors, ultimately risking a fragmented Internet and single market,” a broad coalition, ranging from civil society and media organizations to audiovisual players, wrote earlier this month. The continent’s biggest telecom companies have long argued that stifling rules and a fragmented single market make it hard for them to scale and earn sustainable profits. | Andy Rain/EPA Regulators themselves say they don’t see any market failure, or need for a legislative fix. “It’s increasingly hard for me to think that the Commission is approaching this in good faith because they cannot ignore the chaotic impact that something like this would have,” said Benoît Felten, an expert at Plum Consulting who authored a study on the topic commissioned by Big Tech lobby CCIA. Tech companies will fight tooth and nail against any move to hold them to the same obligations that telecom operators have to follow. “The same service, same rules principle should be a no-brainer,” said Alessandro Gropelli, the boss of telecom trade association Connect Europe. “You cannot have competitiveness if one party is playing the game with their hand tied behind their back and the other party is playing the same game with both hands.” INCUMBENTS VS. CHALLENGERS Brussels’ deregulatory mood is further deepening rifts between Europe’s top telecom providers and their challengers, who have long praised the existing rulebook that they say enables them to take on legacy players. “The Commission wants to deregulate dogmatically” in order “to boost the largest operators in Europe,” said Luc Hindryckx, the director general of the European Competitive Telecommunications Association, a trade body. “One way to do it is to weaken the competition to allow a few incumbents to make it through and pave the way for consolidation, because if the competitors are on the verge of bankruptcy, they will ask to be merged.” Telecom challengers are up in arms against the direction of travel, which could see the Commission dial down the regulatory pressure on Europe’s legacy telcos to open their ducts and fiber lines to competitors. The EU executive wants to move away from heavy, upfront rules and closer scrutiny of dominant players to prevent abuse, instead relying on standard law enforcement. It argues the current system worked to boost competition but has outlived its purpose. It is “alarming that the European Commission is now proposing to relax regulation on former fixed monopolies,” a coalition of nine network operators wrote in a letter this month. Signatories — including France’s Iliad and the U.K.’s Vodafone — called out the proposed “backwards step” and warned against the risk of “re-monopolisation.” This shift, the opponents say, could unravel years of progress by undermining market predictability, deterring investment and pushing up wholesale prices — costs that would inevitably be passed on to consumers. “5G has been a disaster because the real 5G is hardly here,” the Commission’s top digital civil servant Roberto Viola said. | Robert Ghement/EPA “In Germany, it seems that people never run a red light. One could say that people no longer run red lights and then change the law that says running a red light is a major offense. What do you think is going to happen?” Hindryckx quipped. The legacy players don’t agree. “The current ex-ante system leads to low investments and harms roll-out of innovative networks,” said Gropelli from Connect Europe. “Reform is a must, or we’ll remain global laggards in roll-out of critical networks.” CAPITALS VS. BRUSSELS National governments also aren’t cheering the reforms, with EU capitals bristling at the idea of Brussels muscling in on territory they consider their own. That’s the case for the allocation of spectrum — the finite and very much in-demand resource powering wireless communications, which is auctioned at a national level for billions of euros. “5G has been a disaster because the real 5G is hardly here,” the Commission’s top digital civil servant Roberto Viola said in September. “We have been sleeping and lost fifteen years in discussing … who should assign the frequencies,” he said. Still, the topic is largely off the table for national governments. “Spectrum harmonization is not the favorite topic of member countries,” Katalin Molnár, the ambassador for Hungary, said last year as the country chaired talks among EU governments on the issue. The current cooperation between countries “works well,” the 27 EU nations said in a joint position, emphasizing that spectrum management is a “key public policy tool” that falls under a “sustained significance of member states’ national competencies in that regard.” This will be a major red line for the Council of the EU, where capitals will eventually hammer out their position on the reforms. The industry, however, says reforms are essential for the economic benefits that the EU is craving. “The wind has never been as strong in the sails of the ship that goes towards a more efficient telecom market today,” GSMA’s Badrinath said. “Is that enough to get the right outcome? Well, that’s what we want to believe.”

BRUSSELS — The European Commission claimed its tech rules escaped unscathed after Sunday’s trade deal with the U.S. But Washington says they’re still on the table. The EU’s regulation of U.S. Big Tech companies is a big bone of contention between the two sides, and a lack of specifics in Sunday’s handshake deal between European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and U.S. President Donald Trump has allowed both sides to push their own narrative. The EU claimed its tech rules were safeguarded, but the U.S. still thinks they need to be discussed. The EU’s “attack on our tech companies, that’s going to be on the table,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNBC on Tuesday, asked whether Sunday’s deal warranted further trade talks with the EU.   This underscores how the U.S. doesn’t seem intent on backing down from its months-long campaign against the EU’s rules on content moderation, digital competition and artificial intelligence — despite the bloc’s insistence that its regulations are not up for negotiation as part of the trade talks.    Even worse, lawmakers fear that the EU’s executive has already given up some ground or that the U.S. will feel empowered by Sunday’s deal to continue its criticisms. NO CONCESSIONS GIVEN The Commission was quick to point out that tech regulation was one of the areas where it had not given an inch, by excluding rulebooks like the Digital Services Act (DSA) and Digital Markets Act (DMA) from the negotiating table.   “There is absolutely no commitment on digital regulation, nor on digital taxes,” said a senior EU official on Monday. They added that the Commission’s defense of the EU’s autonomy to regulate hadn’t received enough attention.   It seemed like a win for the EU. Meanwhile, the U.S. busied itself wringing concessions on digital trade barriers from other countries in trade talks, such as Indonesia. In early July, the bloc’s tech chief Henna Virkkunen drew a red line, telling POLITICO that the DSA, the DMA and the bloc’s artificial intelligence rulebook were all “not part of the trade negotiations from our side.”   It was a fierce rebuke from a high-level EU official after U.S. officials, lawmakers and tech executives had railed for months against rules that, they argued, amounted to censorship (the DSA), unfair targeting of U.S. companies (the DMA) or the stifling of innovation (AI Act).   WILL THEY, WON’T THEY? But Sunday’s deal contained some language that gave the U.S. ammunition for crossing that line in the future. Von der Leyen admitted in her first remarks after the deal that both sides would further “address non-tariff barriers.” The U.S. later said both sides would “address unjustified digital trade barriers.”   Jim Jordan, a powerful U.S. Congress Republican who has led the attacks against the DSA as chair of the Judiciary Committee, said after a Brussels visit on Monday that the DSA may be a “discussion item in the ongoing trade negotiations that the White House has with the European Union.”  | Michael Reynolds/EPA The U.S. began undermining the EU’s claim that it had secured a win and safeguarded its tech regulation in the days following the deal. Jim Jordan, a powerful U.S. Congress Republican who has led the attacks against the DSA as chair of the Judiciary Committee, said after a Brussels visit on Monday that the DSA may be a “discussion item in the ongoing trade negotiations that the White House has with the European Union.”   He promised “to touch base with the folks in the White House” on the matter. Lutnick was quick to pick up his suggestion on Tuesday.   The White House opened a second front by putting out a fact sheet late on Monday, in which it claimed the EU would not go ahead with so-called network fees — the policy suggestion that the largest online platforms, mostly American ones like Netflix and YouTube, should chip in for the cost of Europe’s telecom infrastructure.  The Commission’s spokesperson for trade, Olof Gill, confirmed the claim to reporters on Tuesday in a frantic session where the bloc scrambled to defend its trade deal. “That’s correct, but that doesn’t impinge on our rules or regulatory space,” he said, emphasizing that “we are not moving on our right to regulate autonomously in the digital space.”  LOOK OVER YOUR SHOULDER Some fear that instead of settling the issue for good, Brussels will continue to have to look over its shoulder when deploying or enforcing its tech rules. Virkkunen promised in June that several DSA probes would be wrapped up in the coming weeks and months, in particular one against Elon Musk’s X. “Now that the deal is done, we should expect results,” said Nick Reiners, senior tech analyst at Eurasia Group. “That said, the Commission will be cautious as the deal is still only in principle.”  The EU’s executive will also have to tread carefully on the topic of network fees as part of its new telecom law in December. It has shelved the highly disputed network fees proposal, also known as fair share, for some time, opting instead to explore alternative regulatory options. But critics aren’t happy as they argue they will amount to network fees by a different name. With the EU’s retreat on network fees now out in the open, the Commission may have to tread more carefully and be ready to debunk any accusations that it’s breaking the trade peace by sneaking them back in. Others have an even more pessimistic outlook. They claim that the EU has succumbed to Trump’s terms, which will empower the U.S. to go after the EU even harder. “It sends the wrong signal: If we fold under pressure, what’s to stop Trump from coming after our legislation next?” S&D lawmaker Brando Benifei, one of the Parliament’s leads on the AI Act, said in a press release. The Commission didn’t comment on Lutnick’s remarks before the publication of this article.  

President Donald Trump on Monday went further than he ever has in helping Ukraine defend itself against Russia, greenlighting a European purchase of Patriot missile defense systems and other weapons for Ukraine. That doesn’t mean he thinks Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy holds the cards. Trump still believes Moscow has the upper hand, according to a senior White House official. But as his frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin has grown, he is more willing to take part in a conflict he insisted he could settle quickly. “The president’s view is Russia is going to win, it’s a matter of how long it takes,” said the senior White House official, granted anonymity to discuss the president’s thinking. “Russia has the bigger economy, has the bigger military, has more than enough bodies to throw into the meat grinder, and just doesn’t care. And although they are making slow progress, they are still making progress. The president just wants to stop the killing.” Even as Trump wants to up the pressure on Moscow, bucking the isolationist wing of the MAGA movement, he is insisting that this latest move aligns with his “America First” strategy and fits into a decades-long view that America has been ripped off by allies and that Europe, in particular, has gotten a free ride on defense. Trump, during an Oval Office meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Monday, exaggerated how much money the U.S. has already spent on aid to Ukraine and emphasized that Europeans would finally pay their fair share. “We’re not buying it, but we will manufacture it, and they’re going to be paying for it,” Trump said, referencing “very rich” European allies. “They feel very strongly about it, and we feel strongly about it too, but we’re in for a lot of money, and we just, we don’t want to do [it] any more.” The Pentagon’s top policy official, Elbridge Colby, posted his support on X soon after the announcement, emphasizing the “America First” aspect. “Central to President Trump’s common sense, America First message is that our alliances have to be fair and equitable for them to be sustainable,” Colby wrote. “This is eminently reasonable but was treated for many years as heresy. Yet now with the historic NATO commitment we see that it can work — and will leave not only Americans but our European allies better off.” But two senior administration officials, granted anonymity to discuss the president’s turnabout on Ukraine, said Trump’s response is largely a reaction to Putin’s indifference to attempts to broker a peace deal. “Some of the recent Russian attacks have been the worst attacks yet,” the senior White House official said. “And it’s grown more indiscriminate lately and the President is not appreciative of that.” The two administration officials also acknowledged that European leaders have strategically placated Trump’s demands for the continent, specifically to spend billions more on their collective defense. Trump specifically pointed to last month’s NATO meeting, during which nearly all members pledged to increase spending on defense, as helping justify his decision to provide greater support to Ukraine. The president also alluded to his view of the conflict during Monday’s meeting, praising the “courage” of Ukraine before nearly repeating his refrain to Zelenskyy some months ago that it doesn’t “have the cards” against Russia in the long run. “They continue to fight with tremendous courage, but they don’t have — they’re losing on equipment,” Trump said. But many in the MAGA movement remain wary and confused by how quickly the president went from berating Zelensky as ungrateful to holding the Ukrainians up as a model of courage. “The European money mitigates it,” said one former Trump campaign official and longtime ally, granted anonymity to discuss internal conversations. “But we still hate it. This is not our war, and escalation isn’t in America’s interest.” Steve Bannon, the former Trump senior adviser, blasted the announcement on his “War Room” podcast on Monday, suggesting that Zelensky’s “number one priority” was drawing Trump deeper into the conflict. “We’re about to arm people we have literally no control over,” Bannon said. “This is not [the] global war on terror. This is old-fashioned, grinding war in the bloodlands of Europe — and we’re being dragged into it.” A White House official disputed that the president’s political base opposed his moves, pointing to a recent Echelon Insights poll showing that nearly two-thirds of Trump voters support continuing to send arms to Ukraine. The person, granted anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly, pointed to social media posts from pro-Trump figures crediting him for NATO’s new spending pledge and getting Europe to fully subsidize new weapons for Ukraine. Anna Kelly, the White House deputy press secretary, dismissed the remarks. “The MAGA base and the over 77 million Americans who voted for President Trump aren’t panicans like the media,” she said. “They trust in Trump, and they know that this president is restoring peace through strength.” Paul McLeary contributed to this report.