Policy & Research
Policy
EIES’ research and policy programme develops actionable recommendations for EU and national policymakers, industry, financial institutions and defence leaders to improve energy infrastructure and supply chain security, as well as strengthen Europe’s industrial and technological base.
EIES’ policy work builds on its risk-based security framework and criteria for strategic technologies to prioritise investments in Europe that contribute most directly to Europe’s long-term prosperity and resilience.
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Control over critical raw material (CRM) supply chains – or lack thereof – directly impacts Europe's energy independence and technological leadership. 60 to 95% of the EU’s CRM and rare earth elements, used across defence, energy, and strategic technology sectors, come from China, creating severe vulnerabilities for European industries.
EIES calls for
Investing in European minerals and metals extraction, processing, and recycling projects;
Developing concrete global alliances, mechanisms and third-country projects that support secure allied supply chains.
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Europe must strengthen its industrial and technological capacity to mitigate security threats in the context of increased global geopolitical risks. Strategic technological areas should be prioritised to enable European companies to compete globally while strengthening strategic autonomy. This requires fostering innovation, enabling private investments in manufacturing, and creating regulatory frameworks that enhance global competitiveness and protect against current and emerging risks.
Maintaining an advanced industrial base is crucial for innovation and for reducing reliance on adversarial states like China, which produces 70–90% of the world’s battery components and around 90% of the world’s solar panels.
EIES calls for
Prioritising and fast-tracking the manufacturing of strategic materials, technologies and components that deliver economic prosperity and security;
Promoting industrial cooperation and complementarity across Europe and global partners.
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Physical, cyber and hybrid attacks on Europe’s energy infrastructure threaten to destabilise Europe’s energy system. Modernising, hardening, and expanding energy infrastructure is essential to expedite the secure transmission of cheaper, domestically produced energy, and reduce Europe’s costly dependence on imported fuels.
EIES calls for
Accelerating the deployment and upgrade of resilient energy generation and transportation infrastructure, particularly pan-European projects and through electrification;
Promoting intergovernmental, NATO-EU, and public-private cooperation in the face of growing physical, cyber, and technology risks.
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As a mostly fossil fuel-poor continent, Europe must diversify energy inputs and forge strong partnerships to ensure its energy security. Energy diplomacy and trade with like-minded countries are key to securing critical resources, advancing Europe's influence, and upholding high standards across supply chains.
EIES calls for
Strengthening trade cooperation, energy and supply chain security with G7 members and other like-minded partners;
Focusing the Global Gateway and Mineral Security Partnership on concrete energy and infrastructure projects that deliver benefits to host countries and Europe alike.
EIES recruits experts to support our research on a rolling basis.
Use the link below to get in touch with our policy team.
Insights
Batteries are the backbone of the modern economy. On 2 September, EIES and its partners convened policymakers, CEOs and senior leaders from across the battery value chain to discuss what the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA) must deliver.
The message was unequivocal: the IAA could become a defining intervention in European industrial policy, but it will succeed only if it changes investment decisions and builds production in Europe.
Securing Europe’s Energy Transition: Lessons from a Scenario Game on Battery Storage and Resilience
Europe cannot prevent every energy-system shock, but it can design infrastructure, supply chains and policy to limit disruption and accelerate recovery: ‘resilience by design’.
For Europe, secure electrification means designing resilience into battery supply chains and energy systems from the outset. The EU should use the Industrial Accelerator Act, procurement and investment policy to anchor strategic capabilities in Europe, diversify trusted supply and ensure that critical systems can withstand disruption, recover rapidly and remain under trusted control.
This is the principal lesson drawn by participants spanning utilities and grid operators, battery systems and battery supply chains, investors and insurers, NATO, and European institutions.
In the hypothetical 2027 scenario, repeated closures of the Strait of Hormuz cause a tightening of energy and battery-adjacent inputs, while heatwave-driven power stress is compounded by new US secure-battery rules. This creates an extraterritorial supplier shock, alongside additional cyber disruption in power balancing.
EIES contribution to the European Commission's public consultation on the EU Critical Raw Materials Centre.
The European Critical Raw Materials Centre should be an autonomous European body or public-private partnership with its own legal personality outside the European Commission, capitalised through a blend of European Union (EU), member states’ and private money, and run by professionals.
The Centre should produce centralised market intelligence across materials value chains. The Centre should also be able to act to mitigate supply chain and market risks.
The Centre should be inspired by, but not blindly copy, Japan’s approach. It should have a lean, highly skilled in-house team with genuine experience in mining and metals equity and debt, hedging, logistics and commodity trading.
EIES recommends that the Centre be designed from inception to reduce its dependence on annual EU budget appropriations by monetising the market functions the Commission already proposes to give it.
Of the options on the table, an executive agency attached to the Commission should be excluded: it cannot raise capital, cannot take commercial risk, and cannot pay for market talent.
EIES recommends launching a European Minerals Investment Network (E-MIN) in the interim, to assess Europe’s needs across critical raw materials and direct public and private funds towards a pipeline of strategic projects.
Statement on the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA)
The IAA can turn Europe’s sustainable, competitiveness and security goals into industrial reality. In an era of aggressive resource and technological competition globally, Europe must urgently adopt a more assertive, impactful Made in EU strategy to rebuild its industrial leadership and secure its long-term competitiveness, economic security and clean energy future.
Batteries and their supply chains are critical in this. Beyond transport decarbonisation, batteries are a foundational technology for Europe’s strategic sectors – including resilient energy systems with clean power supply and grid stability, critical infrastructure, defense capabilities and advanced medical technologies. While Europe's battery sector faces severe market headwinds, immediate targeted support is critical to secure this strategic value chain before the window of opportunity closes.
Excessive dependencies on single-source third countries create strategic vulnerabilities for Europe. There is a real risk that dominant players will continue weaponising critical minerals. To defend the continent against external pressure, Europe needs a higher level of energy and supply chain security.
All this necessitates establishing a competitive and locally anchored battery ecosystem that is essential for strategic autonomy and sovereignty, and to reduce structural dependencies on imported fossil fuels. The transition must be implemented in line with industrial readiness and together with strategic partners with strong long-term technological and investment engagement in the European market. Therefore, strong IAA provisions are needed to create the investment certainty required to quickly scale a domestic European battery value chain, strengthen existing industrial assets and avoid further strategic dependencies.
EIES contribution to the European Commission's public consultation on the EU Critical Raw Materials Centre.
The European Critical Raw Materials Centre should be an autonomous European body or public-private partnership with its own legal personality outside the European Commission, capitalised through a blend of European Union (EU), member states’ and private money, and run by professionals.
The Centre should produce centralised market intelligence across materials value chains. The Centre should also be able to act to mitigate supply chain and market risks.
The Centre should be inspired by, but not blindly copy, Japan’s approach. It should have a lean, highly skilled in-house team with genuine experience in mining and metals equity and debt, hedging, logistics and commodity trading.
EIES recommends that the Centre be designed from inception to reduce its dependence on annual EU budget appropriations by monetising the market functions the Commission already proposes to give it.
Of the options on the table, an executive agency attached to the Commission should be excluded: it cannot raise capital, cannot take commercial risk, and cannot pay for market talent.
EIES recommends launching a European Minerals Investment Network (E-MIN) in the interim, to assess Europe’s needs across critical raw materials and direct public and private funds towards a pipeline of strategic projects.
Statement on the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA)
The IAA can turn Europe’s sustainable, competitiveness and security goals into industrial reality. In an era of aggressive resource and technological competition globally, Europe must urgently adopt a more assertive, impactful Made in EU strategy to rebuild its industrial leadership and secure its long-term competitiveness, economic security and clean energy future.
Batteries and their supply chains are critical in this. Beyond transport decarbonisation, batteries are a foundational technology for Europe’s strategic sectors – including resilient energy systems with clean power supply and grid stability, critical infrastructure, defense capabilities and advanced medical technologies. While Europe's battery sector faces severe market headwinds, immediate targeted support is critical to secure this strategic value chain before the window of opportunity closes.
Excessive dependencies on single-source third countries create strategic vulnerabilities for Europe. There is a real risk that dominant players will continue weaponising critical minerals. To defend the continent against external pressure, Europe needs a higher level of energy and supply chain security.
All this necessitates establishing a competitive and locally anchored battery ecosystem that is essential for strategic autonomy and sovereignty, and to reduce structural dependencies on imported fossil fuels. The transition must be implemented in line with industrial readiness and together with strategic partners with strong long-term technological and investment engagement in the European market. Therefore, strong IAA provisions are needed to create the investment certainty required to quickly scale a domestic European battery value chain, strengthen existing industrial assets and avoid further strategic dependencies.
Featured Report
The expansion of offshore wind is transforming the North and Baltic Seas into a strategic energy backbone for Germany and Europe, critical to industrial competitiveness and energy security. Yet, with growing evidence of cyber, hybrid and physical attacks, security and resilience measures have not kept pace with the sector’s growing importance.
As North Sea countries prepare to build 300 GW of offshore-wind capacity by 2050, ensuring security keeps pace with deployment is a challenge for its energy security and industrial resilience. This EIES report examines the cyber, physical and supply chain vulnerabilities of offshore wind in Germany specifically and sets out how to prevent them, mitigate disruption and strengthen response and recovery. Europe is wiring its grids, military bases and data centres with battery systems it does not control, built and operated by a strategic rival. And it is spending public money to do so: funding the very Chinese dependence Brussels regulators seek to mitigate, putting Europe's battery industry at risk.
EIES report, 'Jumpstarting Europe's Battery Industry – A Strategy for Energy Security', draws on over 30 industry expert interviews to set out how Europe can strengthen its battery industry: build demand for European-made batteries, secure it against foreign pressure, and anchor it to its energy and defence needs.
Without course correction, Europe forfeits its last realistic chance at a battery industry of its own. As a gateway technology, whose supply chains, processing and know-how feed critical sectors and technologies across the continent, a domestic battery industry is a precondition for Europe's industrial resilience.
Publications
The expansion of offshore wind is transforming the North and Baltic Seas into a strategic energy backbone for Germany and Europe, critical to industrial competitiveness and energy security. Yet, with growing evidence of cyber, hybrid and physical attacks, security and resilience measures have not kept pace with the sector’s growing importance.
As North Sea countries prepare to build 300 GW of offshore-wind capacity by 2050, ensuring security keeps pace with deployment is a challenge for its energy security and industrial resilience. This EIES report examines the cyber, physical and supply chain vulnerabilities of offshore wind in Germany specifically and sets out how to prevent them, mitigate disruption and strengthen response and recovery. Europe is wiring its grids, military bases and data centres with battery systems it does not control, built and operated by a strategic rival. And it is spending public money to do so: funding the very Chinese dependence Brussels regulators seek to mitigate, putting Europe's battery industry at risk.
EIES report, 'Jumpstarting Europe's Battery Industry – A Strategy for Energy Security', draws on over 30 industry expert interviews to set out how Europe can strengthen its battery industry: build demand for European-made batteries, secure it against foreign pressure, and anchor it to its energy and defence needs.
Without course correction, Europe forfeits its last realistic chance at a battery industry of its own. As a gateway technology, whose supply chains, processing and know-how feed critical sectors and technologies across the continent, a domestic battery industry is a precondition for Europe's industrial resilience.
In this independent brief, @Thomas O’Donnell argues that a coordinated US-Ukrainian campaign, including sanctions, tariffs, and air strikes on Russian oil infrastructure, could severely damage Russia's oil industry. Rising inflation and elevated interest rates have already intensified the Kremlin’s economic challenges, especially as oil prices remain near their lowest since Russia’s invasion, while armed forces target Moscow’s critical infrastructure to disrupt its oil exports.
The North Sea as Europe’s Energy Backbone outlines policy recommendations to secure the large-scale deployment of offshore wind in the North Sea, including bankable de-risked investment frameworks, integrated cross-border maritime grid planning, and strengthened public-private cooperation to protect critical offshore energy infrastructure.
China’s export controls and market manipulation have triggered major global supply chain disruptions and exposed Europe’s vulnerabilities, from batteries to defence systems. The G7’s Critical Minerals Action Plan and NATO’s Defence-Critical Supply Chain Security Roadmap recognise these as risks to our collective security.
Through RESourceEU, the European Commission must produce measures that address both short- and longer-term challenges. If European governments, financiers and offtakers do not invest rapidly in strategic raw materials projects, competitors and adversaries will beat them to the punch and secure these resources.
Beijing’s manipulation of and recent export restrictions on critical raw materials – many of which upon which Europe holds more than a 90% import reliance – put Europe’s industrial base and economy at risk. As China and the US pursue capital-backed political critical minerals agendas, the absence of a comprehensive European financial architecture exposes the continent’s limitations in catalysing necessary investment in critical mineral value chains.
Intensifying competition from China, coupled with domestic regulatory barriers, component supply chain risks, and infrastructure bottlenecks, are challenging European wind manufacturers’ longstanding leadership. Against the Headwinds: Securing Europe’s Wind Sector, outlines a pathway to enhance European leadership in wind power.
Intensifying competition from China, coupled with domestic regulatory barriers, component supply chain risks, and infrastructure bottlenecks, are challenging European wind manufacturers’ longstanding leadership. Against the Headwinds: Securing Europe’s Wind Sector, outlines a pathway to enhance European leadership in wind power.
China’s export controls and market manipulation have triggered major global supply chain disruptions and exposed Europe’s vulnerabilities, from batteries to defence systems. The G7’s Critical Minerals Action Plan and NATO’s Defence-Critical Supply Chain Security Roadmap recognise these as risks to our collective security.
Through RESourceEU, the European Commission must produce measures that address both short- and longer-term challenges. If European governments, financiers and offtakers do not invest rapidly in strategic raw materials projects, competitors and adversaries will beat them to the punch and secure these resources.
Beijing’s manipulation of and recent export restrictions on critical raw materials – many of which upon which Europe holds more than a 90% import reliance – put Europe’s industrial base and economy at risk. As China and the US pursue capital-backed political critical minerals agendas, the absence of a comprehensive European financial architecture exposes the continent’s limitations in catalysing necessary investment in critical mineral value chains.
EIES report, 'Jumpstarting Europe's Battery Industry – A Strategy for Energy Security', draws on over 30 industry expert interviews to set out how Europe can strengthen its battery industry: build demand for European-made batteries, secure it against foreign pressure, and anchor it to its energy and defence needs.
Without course correction, Europe forfeits its last realistic chance at a battery industry of its own. As a gateway technology, whose supply chains, processing and know-how feed critical sectors and technologies across the continent, a domestic battery industry is a precondition for Europe's industrial resilience.
Intensifying competition from China, coupled with domestic regulatory barriers, component supply chain risks, and infrastructure bottlenecks, are challenging European wind manufacturers’ longstanding leadership. Against the Headwinds: Securing Europe’s Wind Sector, outlines a pathway to enhance European leadership in wind power.
Intensifying competition from China, coupled with domestic regulatory barriers, component supply chain risks, and infrastructure bottlenecks, are challenging European wind manufacturers’ longstanding leadership. Against the Headwinds: Securing Europe’s Wind Sector, outlines a pathway to enhance European leadership in wind power.
The expansion of offshore wind is transforming the North and Baltic Seas into a strategic energy backbone for Germany and Europe, critical to industrial competitiveness and energy security. Yet, with growing evidence of cyber, hybrid and physical attacks, security and resilience measures have not kept pace with the sector’s growing importance.
As North Sea countries prepare to build 300 GW of offshore-wind capacity by 2050, ensuring security keeps pace with deployment is a challenge for its energy security and industrial resilience. This EIES report examines the cyber, physical and supply chain vulnerabilities of offshore wind in Germany specifically and sets out how to prevent them, mitigate disruption and strengthen response and recovery. Europe is wiring its grids, military bases and data centres with battery systems it does not control, built and operated by a strategic rival. And it is spending public money to do so: funding the very Chinese dependence Brussels regulators seek to mitigate, putting Europe's battery industry at risk.
In this independent brief, @Thomas O’Donnell argues that a coordinated US-Ukrainian campaign, including sanctions, tariffs, and air strikes on Russian oil infrastructure, could severely damage Russia's oil industry. Rising inflation and elevated interest rates have already intensified the Kremlin’s economic challenges, especially as oil prices remain near their lowest since Russia’s invasion, while armed forces target Moscow’s critical infrastructure to disrupt its oil exports.
The North Sea as Europe’s Energy Backbone outlines policy recommendations to secure the large-scale deployment of offshore wind in the North Sea, including bankable de-risked investment frameworks, integrated cross-border maritime grid planning, and strengthened public-private cooperation to protect critical offshore energy infrastructure.
