Clean Industrial Deal and Affordable Energy Action Plan commit to accelerate innovation in electricity grids

Brussels, 27 February 2025 – ‘Boosting innovation’ has been announced as an important element of the forthcoming European Grids Package, as laid out in the Clean IndustrialDeal published by the European Commission yesterday. The Affordable Energy Action Plan, also released yesterday, rightly recognizes grid enhancing technologies as a massive opportunity to boost grid capacity and reduce the cost of much-needed grid expansion for all Europeans.

“We are thrilled that the European Commission has committed to accelerating the deployment of innovation in the upcoming Grids Package” says Layla Sawyer, Secretary General of CurrENT. “The Affordable Energy Action Plan also rightly recognizes that grid enhancing technologies are not yet widely deployed, even though they can save hundreds of billions of euros for European citizens.”

Innovation is one of the key pillars of the Competitiveness Compass, and closing the Innovation Gap is one of the priorities highlighted in the Draghi Report. Europe must remain vigilant that innovation is not considered only as a “longer term structural measure”, but that sufficient focus is placed on actually deploying the innovation that has already been developed, particularly if it can bring benefits starting today and are significantly less resource intensive.