ENERGY and green policies should be ideal for common European action. Pollutants know no borders. The cost of renewables such as wind turbines and solar panels can be cut, and their drawbacks mitigated, if they are linked across Europe. When the wind stops blowing in Germany the sun shines in Spain; if both sources die down, French nuclear plants or Swiss hydroelectric stations can take up the slack. A proper European-level emissions-trading scheme should minimise the cost of reducing greenhouse gases. And a successful low-carbon transition should reduce dependence on imported fossil fuels.Yet the reality is messier. The EU struggles with a hotch-potch of national policies, conflicting and expensive subsidies, Balkanised energy markets and ever-growing reliance on fuel imports. After years of crisis, Europeans are more concerned with the cost of climate-change policies than with their benefits. European industries pay three to four times more for gas, and over twice as much for electricity, as American ones (which benefit from cheap shale gas). One reason Europe has so far met its emissions targets is its long economic slump. Yet recession and deindustrialisation…
