How much do EU country’s subsidies the fossil industry? Investigate Europe’s journalists accessed available sources — including government data and think tank reports — to arrive at an estimate of least €137 billion annually. This also includes the United Kingdom, Norway and Switzerland.
For our investigation into the European state’s Dirty Subsidies, we have used available numbers on direct subsidies, tax reliefs and ta exemptions, investments in infrastructure for the fossil sector and did calculations on the free allocations of emission rights. For this we used government sources, reports from the OECD as well as from organisations such as the Climate Action Network. We consulted with think tanks such as the German Institute for Applied Ecology. For each subsidy, we have used the latest available data from the years 2016-2019. In total, the 27 EU countries plus Norway, Switzerland and the United Kingdom subsidise the fossil industry with at least €137 billion annually.