In fact, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was downright jubilant after the elections, saying that the political centre was “holding” as her European People’s Party (EPP) won 189 of 720 seats to remain the largest party by far. While the liberal (Renew) and socialist (S&D) parties lost seats, the groups together held enough ground to have a workable majority in Parliament. The Greens, who lost 19 seats to return to their pre-2019 size, also look likely to support the conservative EPP, ensuring a comfortable majority.

There were serious concerns heading into the election that the far right would win enough seats to force itself into a ruling coalition and roll back parts of the continent’s Green Deal (a sweeping package to boost renewables, energy efficiency and building renovations; reduce methane emissions; develop a carbon border tax; boost EVs; expand carbon taxes and more), but that bullet has been dodged, and in doing so, von der Leyen has secured her single greatest legacy.

“The election results show that while the far right has gained some ground, they do not have enough seats to form a stable ruling coalition or dismantle the European Green Deal,” says Linda Kalcher, executive director of Strategic Perspectives, a Brussels-based think tank. “Any rollback would be economic insanity as it would create uncertainty for business and investors at times when the U.S. and China are the more appealing destinations for net-zero industries.”

Analysts see two primary concerns about Europe’s climate ambitions in the future: procrastination at the EU level and delay at the national level.

“With increased pressure from the right, the mainstream centre-right European People’s Party might be tempted to push for postponements or watering down some of the most controversial provisions of the Green Deal (such as the 2035 ban on internal combustion engines),” wrote Simone Tagliapietra, a senior fellow at Bruegel, a European think tank that specializes in economics. The other risk is that “Germany, France, Italy and other large countries are expected to do the heavy lifting, but what if their governments do not deliver?”

One national diplomat, who preferred to remain anonymous but was intimately involved in Green Deal negotiations, is optimistic: “As competitiveness and security come into greater focus due to external events, the clearest pathway to achieving these goals is to drive forward with policies that deliver on European renewable and energy-efficiency targets. This is the most cost-effective way to ensure energy security, autonomy, competitiveness and decarbonization.”

During the election campaign, it was clear that climate issues would not be front and centre the way they had been in 2019. “The main priorities [now] will include strengthening industrial competitiveness, enhancing energy security, and addressing the cost-of-living crisis,” Kalcher says. “The new coalition can align on a European industrial strategy that delivers on decarbonization goals, reindustrializing the economy and reducing dependency on fossil fuel imports.”

Essentially, decarbonization efforts are likely to continue, but the motivation will be different – it will be about energy security, protecting jobs and helping industry.

“However, efforts related to biodiversity and nature protection might face more resistance due to the protests by farmers,” Kalcher adds.

Farmer protests have been a regular occurrence in several EU countries over the last year. Irish and Dutch farmers have protested over nitrogen emissions limits, Polish farmers blocked shipments of now tarif-free Ukrainian wheat, French farmers have dumped manure in front of government buildings over low prices and overseas competition, and German farmers protested the end of fuel subsidies. Greece, Portugal and Italy have also seen tractors in their streets.

The first big test for the new Parliament will be the approval of the bloc’s 2040 targets. They are a key complement to the existing legally binding 2030 and 2050 targets. A European Commission report earlier this year recommended a 90% emissions-reduction target compared to 1990 levels, but there has not yet been a formal legislative proposal. That will fall on the incoming Parliament and Commission likely in early 2025.

If conservative parliamentarians do try to weaken the 2040 targets, it could mean that the next few years will be very rocky indeed for European climate action.

Perhaps the biggest surprise of the elections came from France. President Emmanuel Macron called snap legislative elections after his party, Renaissance, was trounced in the European elections. If the far-right National Rally (RN) wins the domestic elections scheduled for June 30 and July 7, it would claim the post of prime minister, while Macron would continue as president until 2027.

Marine Le Pen, who leads the RN in the legislature, threatened to pull France out of the EU Green Deal and to impose a moratorium against wind turbines (on shore and off) and on all solar production. She did promise not to take France out of the Paris Agreement, at least.

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But this boast is worth more consideration than usual. Canada Nickel’s bold plan could have serious implications far beyond its operations in Timmins. Just weeks before Canada Nickel launched NetZero Metals, the European Union unveiled its pandemic recovery plan. It’s one of the grandest gestures in the history of a political body known mostly for stuffy bureaucratic pronouncements – more than €1.8 trillion in grants and loans, equivalent to nearly 5% of the EU’s GDP. And it leans heavily into a global energy transition whose standard bearer, Germany, was a lead partner in selling the other 26 member nations on the plan. Fully 30% of the package will be spent on initiatives aimed at “climate concerns,” with a similar focus for the other trillion dollars in the EU’s upcoming budget (which covers EU initiatives from 2021 to 2027, not just the pandemic recovery). France – the other lead partner in the EU deal – has since announced that it will spend €30 billion of its domestic recovery package on clean energy initiatives as well.

“With nickel as a preferred metal to power the clean energy revolution,” said Canada Nickel CEO Mark Selby at the launch of NetZero Metals, “our commitment to net-zero carbon production is the right step to take for the environment, for consumers, and for our investors.” You have to assume he was looking past Ottawa and not even glancing in Washington’s direction when he said it. Canada Nickel’s bet is that the EU’s green-saturated recovery is the future of the global economy and the best target for even an established heavy industry like mining. Manufacturing electric vehicles and renewable energy equipment, after all, requires an awful lot of nickel and cobalt.

Now, to paraphrase the great philosopher Ferris Bueller, Canadians aren’t European, nor do we plan on being European, so who gives a crap if they’re green industrialists? Canada’s largest trading partner, by a margin so wide as to be irreducible from the perspective of any particular government’s policy agenda, is the United States. (The current numbers are about 75% of all exports and 51% of all imports; no other nation has more than a 13% share of either end of Canada’s trade.) This is as true for nickel and iron as it is for softwood lumber, auto parts and pro hockey players.

But as one of those exported hockey stars once so famously put it, the way to win – in business as in hockey – is to focus not on where the puck is but on where it is going. And that’s where Canada Nickel’s net-zero bet comes in. If Canada’s heavy industries want to steer clear of a rust-belt scenario, they need to move now to where this century’s best economic opportunities are emerging – and those are increasingly found in the fast-growing cleantech sector. What’s more, Canada’s federal government has a net-zero pledge of its own. The deadline is a distant mid-century, to be sure, but Canada stands now at the bottom of that long ramp alongside numerous EU countries, leading U.S. jurisdictions like California and New York, and pace-setting companies like Google and Microsoft.

And more than that, Canada has a powerful set of assets to bring to the worldwide net-zero movement – its world-class mix of abundant natural resources and low-emissions electricity grids. Nationwide, 81% of Canada’s electricity is derived from non-emitting sources, with hydro powerhouses like British Columbia and Quebec already boasting virtually emissions-free grids. Hydro-Québec, for example, now actively courts data-centre clients on the merits of its clean power. And the choice of Montreal for the world’s first emissions-free aluminum production facility (Elysis, a joint venture of Rio Tinto and Alcan, catalyzed by Apple’s demand for zero-carbon aluminum) was a direct result of its climate-friendly virtues.

“The race for clean materials is certainly one that Canada could play a role in and could be important for Canada,” says Sarah Petrevan, policy director at Clean Energy Canada. Beyond the mineral wealth touted by Canada Nickel, she says, Canadian exports like aluminum, steel, concrete and fertilizer could all be valuable in markets like the EU where a smaller carbon footprint will increasingly impart competitive advantage.

And Canada Nickel is far from alone in its ambitious gaze to that low-carbon horizon. In British Columbia, Lafarge has launched plans for the nation’s lowest-carbon cement plant, bringing in carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology and fuel from non-recyclable waste. In Alberta, oil sands producer Cenovus Energy has a net-zero pledge of its own, and numerous companies are making big investments in everything from CCS to hydrogen fuel to shrink-the-oil-patch’s footprint. In northern Ontario, Goldcorp has opened the world’s first emissions-free gold mine, converting all on-site equipment to electric power. The list goes on, and many eyes in such firms are looking to export markets as climate plans grow stronger.

Beyond direct trade, though, Petrevan argues that the EU’s green recovery is the right “level of ambition.” If Canada’s climate goals – its 2030 Paris pledge as well as the net-zero target – are at all serious, then Canadian aspirations need to catch up with European plans. “The EU is the gold standard by which Canada should be judged,” Petrevan says.

Canada’s own pandemic recovery plans, then, represent a golden opportunity to bring our climate policies in line, finally, with our lofty goals. Government procurement rules, for example, don’t yet oblige the government to purchase the kinds of low-carbon materials Canada needs to be producing more of to hit its climate targets – and encourage the growth of companies like Canada Nickel.

“We’ve got everything we need to succeed,” says Chris Bataille, a researcher at the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations in Paris who has worked on decarbonization policy in Canada and internationally for more than a decade. “We’ve just got to reorient our efforts.”

Chris Turner’s most recent book is The Patch: The People, Pipelines, and Politics of the Oil Sands.

With the support of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Canada.

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