Outlook 2024: Competing priorities for green industrial policy

Three overarching policy goals can be seen to achieve decarbonisation

International governments are adopting more interventionist economic policies, particularly concerning the energy transition and associated clean technologies. Since the early 2000s, industrial policy has been a key feature of the drive for decarbonisation, but recently the priorities have shifted. While earlier efforts were concerned with reducing greenhouse gas emissions, a newfound enthusiasm focuses on reducing dependence on global value chains, which are increasingly perceived as threatening. Growing acceptance of the inevitability of energy transition also sees countries keen to gain domestic market share of rapidly growing green industries. With the Inflation Reduction Act, the US has