By Anthony Fletcher - 18th September 2007
The European commission’s adoption of proposals to protect fair competition in the EU energy market has met with support from MEPs.
The package is designed to promote sustainability by stimulating energy efficiency and guaranteeing that smaller companies have access to the energy market.
It was welcomed by Green energy spokesperson Claude Turmes as an “attempt to safeguard strategically important infrastructure”.
“We welcome the commission's attempt to address this,” he said.
“Clearly only full and unequivocal unbundling of energy production from distribution will guarantee true market liberalisation.”
ALDE leader Graham Watson also welcomed the package, saying that "this is the goal we aspire to in raising the competitiveness of the market in energy".
A major issue has been ‘unbundling’ - the separation between the network operation of electricity and gas from supply and generation activities.
The new proposals make clear that the commission's preferred option in this respect is ownership unbundling - in other words that a single company can no longer own the transmission and also be occupied in energy production or supply activities.
“If a company sells electricity and gas and owns the networks, it has an incentive to ensure that its competitors don’t have access to the network,” commission president José Manuel Barroso told journalists on Wednesday.
“It’s like a supermarket selling its own brands, but offering no shelf space for others. This prevents competition.”
European consumer organisation BEUC welcomes the commission‘s intention to establish a competitive energy market but said that consumers would still not sufficiently be protected and empowered under the proposals.
The measures “are welcomed, but will fall short of enabling consumers to benefit from the opening of the energy markets”, said the organisation.
Turmes was disappointed that the commission had “given in to pressure from French and German governments and failed to insist on full unbundling as the only option for the EU energy market”.
The package also contains safeguards to ensure that third countries wishing to enter the European energy market must comply with EU unbundling requirements.
The commission proposes to establish an agency for the cooperation of national energy regulators, to promote cross border collaboration and investment.
Energy commissioner Andris Piebalgs said that Europe has been moving towards an internal energy market for the last ten years.
“It is now time to complete this process and ensure that the benefits of this market are real, effective and available to each and every person and company,” he said.
“The EU now has to take the necessary steps to ensure that all its citizens can choose their own supplier and be sure that they are getting the best deal."
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