Demand for progress on renewables plan

Date: 04/02/1999

By Chris Johnstone

ENVIRONMENTAL campaigners have called on the European Commission to deliver a promised framework of rules to govern support for renewable energy by the end of the year following Energy Commissioner Christos Papoutsis' dramatic decision to drop existing plans.

Papoutsis has decided not to press ahead with proposals for new EU laws setting out the rules for renewables to compete in a liberalised European power market and will instead issue a working document calling for comments from national governments.

The Commission's proposal was supposed to set out the rules for fair cross-border competition between renewables to match the first steps towards a European single market for electricity.

Renewables, most of which are far from competitive in comparison to conventional energies such as gas and nuclear, are promoted by a wide range of national schemes, creating a risk that the best-supported schemes will win market share at the expense of others.

Close advisers to the Commissioner say drafts of the proposal raised so many objections from some governments that Papoutsis decided it would be better to backtrack and relaunch consultations. "Instead of having something blocked in the Council of Ministers we have decided to go back to governments and put the ball in their court," said Papoutsis' spokesman Costas Verros.

However, environment lobby Climate Network Europe insists the Commission must have a policy for renewables in place by the end of this year or risk indecision harming its attempt to boost their market share.

"This is a setback. We need to keep the pressure up on renewables," said Climate Network's Liam Salter.

Early drafts of the withdrawn proposals would have given some impetus to the use of renewables such as wind power, solar energy, and biomass by setting an interim target for all governments to produce at least 5% of their power from renewables by 2005 or, if they have already reached that target, 3% more than their current contribution.

Energy experts believe that it was the Commission's choice of one particular formula to boost competition between different types of renewables which provoked hostility from some governments.

Papoutsis' officials have made no secret of the fact that they would prefer to create a market for renewables through tradable permits. Under this system, suppliers of electricity are set targets for the use of renewables. If they cannot meet them, they are forced to buy 'green' energy from other sources. In this way, a competitive market for renewable power is created and, it is argued, prices forced down.

However, this option clashes head on with existing procedures in Germany and Spain, where producers of renewable energy are guaranteed generous prices for all the power they feed into the national network.