Decarbonizing industry: Policy approaches to eliminate hard-to-abate emissions

Heavy industry remains among the hardest sectors to decarbonize while accounting for more than a fifth of all greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. Industrial emissions remain so challenging to mitigate largely due to the enormous scale and the diversity of production processes involved. However, just steel, cement, and major petrochemicals (ammonia, methanol, and ethylene) account for half of industrial emissions, and share similar potential decarbonization pathways. This article reviews two major classes of decarbonization: short-term drop-in technologies such as clean heating, and long-term material-specific technologies such as electrochemistry. Implementing both classes of emissions reduction approaches will require significant policy intervention at all stages of the commercialization of these new technologies. Due to recent legislation, there is a notable amount of funding for scaling these technologies, but there remains opportunity for further support via regulation and demand-side interventions.