‘Decarbonisation cannot be a goal in itself’, said Jan Szyszko, Deputy Minister for Funds and Regional Policy, during a panel on the challenges for business connected with decarbonisation and the introduction of new technologies.
Szyszko admitted at the beginning of the discussion that ‘the Green Deal policy and the very term have not been received well by the public'. According to the deputy minister, this criticism cannot be ignored. ‘It is the responsibility of the government to shape decarbonisation, green and development policies in such a way that they receive public support This aspect has been neglected not only in Poland, but across Europe in recent years, and the result was the last year's protests’, Szyszko said. He believes that these protests ‘were caused more by a lack of communication or a sense of exclusion of particular groups from the decision-making process than by the actual rules of the Green Deal’.
‘We should first and foremost ensure that these reforms have a smaller impact on less wealthy people, as well as on companies that already face difficulties. So that those who can afford it pay a relatively higher price for the decarbonisation processes’, explained the Deputy Minister.
Szyszko also pointed out that ETS2, scheduled to come into force in 2027, ‘requires a lot of thought’ – so that ‘it is not a system that makes the least well-off pay the biggest share. Unfortunately, this is what the current version of ETS2 looks like’, he commented.
Zbigniew Liptak, partner and leader of the regulatory advisory team at EY, stressed that the transition towards green energy ‘obviously makes sense from the point of view of the environment and climate, but it also makes economic sense’. ‘If we have more green energy, then (...) hydrocarbons from the East become less necessary and therefore cheaper. We will no longer finance countries that are not necessarily on our side', he said, reminding that when it comes to the EU's trade in goods with the rest of the world, 'we pay most for hydrocarbons'.
