The following, non-exclusive initiatives are deemed most relevant for this opinion.

European Pillar of Social Rights

Commission’s Communication, A strong social europe for just transitions, COM(2020)14

Commission’s Communication, The power of trade partnerships: together for green and just economic growth, COM(2022)409

EU holistic approach to sustainable development

Digital transition website

Green transition website

Strategic foresight report 2021

Strategic foresight report 2021 Strategic foresight report 2022

Fit for Future Platform

The Platform suggested to:

1: Strengthen assessments of combined effects of legislation and policies and reinforce the assessments of non action in impact assessments of the European Commission

2: Explore extending sustainability assessment standards to assess sustainability and digitalisation levels of enterprises

3: Improve access to data through improved broadband infrastructure and governance

4: Stronger use of strategic foresight to ensure the design of future-proof policies

Follow up by the Commission

The horizontal opinion on interconnectivity between the green and the digital transition suggested for example strengthening of the assessments of combined effects of legislation and policies for different stakeholders’ groups in evaluations of related legislation aimed at promoting green and digital transitions. It also called for reinforcing the assessments of non-action in impact assessments, which should better consider long-term impact of (non)regulation and mainstream the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.

The opinion’s early input fed into the Commission’s Strategic Foresight Report 2022, which identified the need for a future-proof and agile EU regulatory framework as one of 10 areas of action for a successful twinning between the green and digital transitions. It also called for EU policymakers to further exploit the use of digital solutions, such as digital twins or artificial intelligence for forecasting, or modelling in impact assessments. The opinion recognises that the twinning - the capacity to mutually reinforce both transitions - could be better analyzed in evaluations, by looking at combined effects. This can further strengthen evidence base to assist in creating quality legislation. It also underlines the importance to identify qualitatively and quantitatively the benefits of Commission’s proposals.

In the first suggestion, the Fit for Future Platform suggested strengthening of the assessments of combined effects of legislation and policies. The Commission, as announced in the Communication Long-term competitiveness of the EU: looking beyond 2030, will work on how to better assess the cumulative impacts of different policy measures at the EU level with a view to develop a methodology. In the meantime, the Commission will continue to use the potential of already existing tools, notably evaluations and fitness checks. The latter in particular, is designed to identify and analyse (to the extent possible and proportionate) synergies (e.g. improved performance, lower costs, reduced burdens, simplification, automation/digitalisation) or inefficiencies (e.g. excessive burdens, overlaps, gaps, inconsistencies, implementation problems or obsolete measures) within a group of measures and help to identify the cumulative impact of the group of interventions, covering both costs and benefits.

The Platform’s second suggestion raised the importance of sustainable enterprises. Towards this objective, the Commission has already embarked on numerous initiatives. Under the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) which entered into force on 5 January 2023, the Commission is expected to adopt a first set of European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) by mid-2023. Those standards will take into account the draft submitted by the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG). The Commission will seek to streamline the implementation of disclosure obligations to the extent possible, while maintaining the EU ambition in terms of green transition and providing guidance to companies.

The Commission has designed the revision of the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive and the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) to be complementary and mutually supportive. The CSRD targets the corporate level and exempts subsidiaries if the parent company is performing consolidated sustainability reporting. The IED Transformation Plans will complement this by providing a means for its implementation at the level of each installation. To limit the additional administrative burden for operators and public authorities, the Commission proposed the inclusion of the Transformation Plans in the operator’s Environmental Management System (EMS), which is already required under IED rules. This approach is consistent with the 20 December 2021 joint industry paper that suggested integrating the IED Transformation Plans into the IED’s EMS.

Trialogue is pending for the Directive on Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence (CS3D). The Commission will strive during the negotiation to preserve its approach as regard preventing unnecessary regulatory burden.

This opinion also stressed the importance of better access to data through improved co-use and governance of existing physical infrastructure for broadband roll out. The Commission’s Gigabit Infrastructure Act proposal concurred with this emphasis. It addresses the shortcomings of the existing rules and contributes to the cost efficient and timely deployment of very high-capacity networks (VHCN) necessary to meet the increased connectivity needs and the Digital Decade connectivity targets¹. The Act extends the concept of ‘physical infrastructure’ to include public non-network assets, updates several definitions to reflect better new realities and improves the framework for inbuilding physical infrastructure. It also steps up transparency requirements on existing physical infrastructure by network operators and public sector bodies owning or controlling physical infrastructure and planned civil works, including with the aim to reduce damage to any existing physical infrastrcutures², which is explictly mentioned in the suggestion 3 of the Fit for Future Platform opinion. The Act regulates the permit granting procedures, making mandatory the availability of the key information elements in electronic format via the Single Information Points (SIP) while the relevant digital tools should allow for an electronic submission of applications and information in the permit process.

This also echoes the above-mentioned opinion of the Fit for Future Platform that recognises the importantance of further fostering the digitalisation of national authorities (public administration, including in rural areas) and interoperability of digital public services. Furthermore, while aiming to reach a harmonised state of play in the EU, the Gigabit Infrastructure Act is proposed as a minimum harmonisation regulation that confers flexibility to the Member States as regards the technical requirements for the Single Information Points, in order to accommodate organisational and administrative differences between the Member States and allowing them to avoid additional administrative burden for both the (local) authorities and the companies. As the Fit for Future Platform’s opinion recommended, the Gigabit Infrastructure Act takes into consideration the reasoned exceptions from data sharing obligations, provided by existing national or EU legislation. For example, the Gigabit Infrasructure Act proposal includes exceptions from obligations for transparency, access provision or coordination of civil works, in case of the critical national infratsructure, as defined by the national legislation. These exceptions that have to be defined by the Member States are needed in order to strengthen the EU’s open strategic autonomy, as the Fit for Future Platform underlines in its above-mentioned opinion.

¹ Digital Decade Policy Programme 2030. Decision (EU) 2022/2481.

² See Recital 25 of the proposal for the Gigabit Infrastructure Act Regulation: “[..]Such minimum information is a pre-requisite to assess the potential for using existing physical infrastructure or coordinating the planned civil works in a specific area, as well as to reduce damage to any existing physical infrastructures”[..].