Industry Interest-Groups and EU Climate Policy: From Foes, to Frenemies, or Friends?

Carbon-intensive industries are among the most influential groups shaping EU climate policy. These industries have long organized politically and lobbied systematically to impede or slow progress toward the EU’s climate policies and goals. In this paper, we examine the lobbying stances of three key industries whose cooperation and actions are crucial to realizing the EU’s ambition to reduce GHG emissions by 55% by 2030 and 90% by 2040: the electric power, automotive, and oil industries. Using an innovative analytical framework focused on interactions among technological, policy, and political drivers of change, we analyze how and to what extent industrial actors have shifted from opposing to supporting EU climate policies—from the first 2009 EU climate and energy package to the 2023 Fit for 55 package. We distinguish conceptually and develop a methodology for assessing the difference between “sincere” and “strategic” policy support: support that is anchored in industry interests and support that misaligns with those interests — representing a political tactic intended to appear cooperative, avoid criticism, and gain influence. By analyzing the drivers and emergence of both sincere and strategic industry support for climate policy, we offer a more nuanced perspective on different forms of interest-group lobbying and their implications for policymaking. Our study employs a comprehensive coding scheme and semi structured interviews to determine industry positions, combining quantitative and qualitative methods to assess the explanatory power of technological and political drivers on actors' interests and position-taking.