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Policy Paper
July 2025

Cleantech: Reducing 
Europe’s Strategic 
Dependence on China

Environment Asia Europe
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Author
Joseph Dellatte
Joseph Dellatte
Resident Fellow - Climate, Energy and Environment

Dr. Joseph Dellatte joined Institut Montaigne’s Asia Program in 2022 as Research Fellow for Climate, Energy, and Environment. He specializes in international climate policy and global climate governance, ETS linkage, and political barriers to carbon pricing development in the Northeast Asian region.

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  • Note (146 pages)
  • Executive Summary (11 pages)

    • The European Union has committed to achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, an ambitious goal enshrined in European climate law. But this green transition comes with a major new strategic challenge: Europe’s growing dependence on critical materials that are essential for clean technologies, whose supply chain is now largely controlled by China and its dominant position in the downstream industrial value chains of these technologies.

    This note analyzes the geopolitical risks and challenges associated with this dependence; examines the industrial strategies adopted by China, Japan, and South Korea; and questions the crucial choices that Europe must make to secure its technological and economic autonomy and build its place in the net-zero economy. It also proposes levers for action to strengthen European industrial sovereignty and build a resilient, innovative, and competitive value chain.

    Faced with rising international tensions and the climate emergency, the European Union is at a turning point: Will it remain a mere consumer or become a major sovereign industrial player in clean technologies?

    Joseph Dellatte
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