Policy News

DG Environment director of strategy,Robin Miege, said that although shale gas could be  a “game-changer” in the United States, condition in Europe were rather different although with Europe’s energy prices over twice the US levels, unconventional fossil fuels are climbing higher up the European policy agenda. The results of the public consultation on Europe’s shale gas prospects, which were presented by the Commission’s environment directorate on 7 June, showed that over half of the respondents were favourable to the development of shale gas in Europe. According to Mr. Miege , potential benefits of European shale gas production are mostly diversification of the EU’s energy mix, energy security, with possibilities in re-negotiating with gas suppliers, but “the effect on prices is not necessarily going to be major”. A majority of respondents to the public consultation indadicated that the main potential benefits of shale gas were indeed decreasing the EU’s energy import dependency costing 1 bln a day, and strengthening the EU’s negotiating position with external suppliers. Over 50% of those questioned also believed that shale gas would make energy cheaper for consumers. However, numerous analyses of the potential impacts are more cautious. Unconventional gas production costs in Europe are likely to be [...]

The EHA attended a high level conference organseed by the Egmont institute for international relations “Beyond the 2020 horizon: Moving towards a common EU energy policy”. According EU president van Rompuy  global energy demand will rise by 30% by 2025 and the EU risks to become the only area in the world to depend almost entirely on oil and gas imports. He also referred to the recent remarks of EC president Barroso that a 20% increase in energy efficiency wouls close 1000 coal power plants. Baringa consultancy reported that current projections for renewable energy are well below the planned and required trajectory overal and for all technologies except PV. Acceleration of investments is likely to lead to increase in costs rather than benefitting form experience curve. Lately the European Energy Policy focus on the triangle with decarbonisation on the top and  affordability and security of supply at the bottom has reversed to affordability and and security of supply at the top and decarbonisation at the bottom.  At the meeting European energy companeis commented on the EU’s energy policy for 2030; Edison suggested to include wind energy lifetime cost consiidrations. Siemens indicated that without storage no balanced grid is possible by 2030 recommended a [...]

The recent EU Council Conclusions on May 22, 203 referred to “significant investments in new and intelligent energy infrastructure  to secure the uninterrupted supply of energy at affordable prices.” In addition the Council listed 7 priority areeas to facilitate investments, among which phasing out harmful subsidies for fossil fuels: