A Norwegian car dealership weighing selling petrol or diesel cars next year, a Swedish industrial start-up urgently needing fresh capital despite having raised an eyewatering $15bn already, the poor uptake for heat pumps across Europe this year.

They may be three seemingly disparate news items, but together they offer signs of the struggles that some Europe business leaders report over the green transition of industry. They worry that Europe’s policymakers are ill prepared for just how expensive the shift is likely to be for the continent, pointing to hundreds of billions of euros in investments and subsidies that are needed. Otherwise, the business leaders warn, competitors such as China and the US are ready to pounce.

“I don’t think European governments have woken up at all to the realisation of just how expensive this will all be. But in terms of jobs, in terms of business, it is so important Europe does not get left behind,” one European industrialist told me.