Sustainability considerations in EU merger control

Abstract Sustainability-related considerations play an increasingly important role in competition assessments, as reflected by the European Commission’s 2024–29 mandate situating competition law within the EU’s climate and industrial strategy, the Clean Industrial Deal. During this mandate, the European Commission will revise its 2004 Horizontal Merger Guidelines and 2008 Non-Horizontal Merger Guidelines. Updating the guidelines provides an opportunity to address the relevance of sustainability-related considerations in relation to market definition, competitive assessment, efficiencies, and remedies. We analyse the economic evidence on the role of sustainability-related considerations in merger control, the Commission’s case practice, and its published guidance on merger assessments. We discuss challenges and provide practical recommendations to agency staff and practitioners, with the objective of facilitating the incorporation of sustainability-related considerations in the revised guidelines.