Renewable energy report takes softly softly approach

Date: 08/04/1999

By Renée Cordes

THE European Commission is set to adopt a strategy for promoting renewable energy next week after several months of foot-dragging.

However, the report drawn up by Acting Energy Commissioner Christos Papoutsis, which is due to be adopted by the full Commission next Tuesday (13 April), will shy away from making any proposals for legislation.

Officials say that this means that the paper can be adopted by the caretaker Commission, despite its pledge to refrain from taking any new political initiatives.

The draft report states that renewable sources of energy “will need support in the short and medium term to develop and fulfil the Kyoto commitments” - a reference to the Union's pledge to reduce emissions of six greenhouse gases by 8&percent; by 2012 at the latest.

The document examines the various ways in which member states and the EU as a whole support renewable energy - through, for example, tax refunds and state aids - without advocating one or the other.

Earlier this year, Papoutsis shelved plans for a proposed directive amid signs of resistance from several member states. His decision was greeted with surprise and dismay by Germany, which had made promoting renewable energy one of the key goals of its six-month EU presidency.

The Acting Commissioner's original proposal, which had been redrafted several times, called for some national support schemes for renewable energy to be phased out and stressed the need to create a competitive European market for 'green' power.

But it ran into fierce resistance from the powerful German wind lobby, which feared it would lose guaranteed state subsidies under the new regime.

The European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) also questioned whether renewable energy producers would be compensated

if the Commission forced changes in national support schemes once investments had been agreed.

Papoutsis' officials say the latest working paper puts a greater emphasis on environmental issues, although aides to Acting Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerre- gaard still argue that the document is too “soft” to have any impact.

The renewables industry has also expressed disappointment over Papoutsis' approach, arguing that legislation is neces-sary to set concrete targets for renewable energy use.

The report due to be adopted next week simply states that the Commission will decide later on what formal measures, if any, to propose and ministers are unlikely to discuss the issue until much later this year.

” If the directive is not back soon, we are in deep trouble,” said the EWEA's executive director Christoph Bourillon.