Barroso in bid to open up energy sector

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso is planning to demand new powers to open up the energy sector next January despite warnings from Berlin that he is "pressing ahead" too fast.

Commission sources confirmed that Barroso will propose new regulations in January to force energy giants to separate their production and distribution arms to ensure greater competition on the market.

Barroso said in a newspaper interview this week: "I am more convinced than ever that we need new legislation concerning regulation", adding that the status quo on the energy market "wasn’t working".

He also favours improving pan-European energy regulation to address the tendency for national regulators to favour their national champions and not take an EU-wide perspective. This could include plans for a Europe-wide agency, he hinted. "If you want an internal market to work in Europe in energy then you need more muscle in terms of the regulators," he said.

But his plans have come under attack from Berlin, echoing opposition from German Chancellor Angela Merkel in March. Joachim Wuermeling, state secretary in the economics ministry, said that splitting up energy companies would be a "massive intervention, which would not improve the situation".

Wuermeling also criticised talk of a pan-European regulator, saying: "No one wants a mammoth European authority." While he said he agreed that the EU’s energy market was not working properly, problems varied from one national market to another. "We think decentralised control is better," the former MEP said.

One EU-based lawyer commented that while he understood the Commission’s desire to give itself extra legal tools to tackle the energy market, Barroso would have to get backing for new powers from exactly those member states like Germany which opposed stronger interference from Brussels.

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso is planning to demand new powers to open up the energy sector next January despite warnings from Berlin that he is "pressing ahead" too fast.

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