Horizon Brief: Geopolitics Drives Industrial Policy
25 April 2026: Geopolitics is Driving EU Industrial Policy — System Insights
In this edition: signal; on the radar; system insights; what I am reading; and one last thing.
Signal
EU to Shield Households and Industry from the Fossil Fuel Price Surge
Who says lightning never strikes twice? In fact, lightning seems to prefer to strike the same place twice. For the second time in less than five years, Europeans have been struck again by a bolt from the blue and are yet again paying the price of Europe’s dependency on imported fossil fuels.
This week, the European Commission proposed “new actions to protect Europeans from the fossil energy crisis,” combining short‑term relief for households and industry with a push toward clean energy independence and reduced exposure to volatile fossil fuel markets.
At last month’s EU Council meeting, EU heads of government requested “a toolbox of targeted temporary measures to address the recent spikes in the prices of imported fossil fuels arising from the crisis in the Middle East”. The measures were also a topic of discussion at the Informal European Council in Cyprus this week.