On 15 December 2022, the Energy Community adopted the remaining parts of the Clean Energy Package together with all outstanding electricity Network Codes and Guidelines. In doing so, the Energy Community has drastically expanded its acquis and made a huge step towards aligning its legal commitments with the EU regulatory electricity framework. Ultimately, this legal reform will contribute towards further decarbonising the energy systems and decreasing the GHG emissions of the Contracting parties, thus facilitating achievement of the climate neutrality objective by 2050.
The implementation of this package presents a major challenge for Europe and will require close cross-border cooperation amongst all stakeholders in the electricity sector. Methodologies for operating the electricity markets will have to be developed, new ways of cooperating among Contracting parties and with EU Member States will have to be established, large market integration projects will have to be implemented, and many new agreements will have to be negotiated.
In the end, however, this journey is set to transform the electricity sector for the Contracting parties–eventually it will enable them to reap the benefits of the EU internal electricity market by bringing them into the European day-ahead, intraday, and balancing platforms on an equal footing.
The Energy Community is an international organisation founded in October 2005 which consists of the European Union and neighbouring non-EU countries (called Contracting Parties). It aims to extend EU internal energy market rules and principles to the Contracting Parties to foster the creation of an integrated pan-European energy market.
The Procedural Act defines the overall framework for extending the EU acquis to the Energy community. It facilitates the integration of the Contracting parties' energy markets into the EU by creating a level playing field for the energy sector stakeholders from the Contracting Parties and the Member States. The transposition deadline for implementing the entire package is 31 December 2023.
The Procedural Act consists of the following four pillars:
Energy sector stakeholders are defined as the following: regulatory and other designated authorities, transmission system operators (TSOs), distribution system operators (DSOs), nominated electricity market operators (NEMOs), and regional coordination centers.
Where a decision adopted by the Ministerial Council concerning the energy and environment acquis obliges energy sector stakeholders to perform tasks and activities involving other energy sector stakeholders, the energy sector stakeholders of both Contracting Parties and EU Member States shall perform such tasks and activities.
Where a decision adopted by the Ministerial Council concerning the energy and environment acquis provides that energy sector stakeholders from Contracting Parties apply terms, conditions, and methodologies already adopted in accordance with procedures of EU law, the relevant energy sector stakeholders from the EU, in particular TSOs and NEMOs, shall treat the energy sector stakeholders from Contracting Parties in the same manner as energy sector stakeholders from the EU.
Provides opinions and recommendations to energy sector stakeholders, as well as, to the European Commission and the Secretariat.
Adopts individual decisions that are binding on energy sector stakeholders
Carries out other tasks designed to it by a Decision adopted by the Ministerial Council;
Where a Decision adopted by the Ministerial Council concerning the energy and environment acquis refers to the Procedural Act, the ENTSO for Electricity shall carry out the tasks stipulated by the Decision in question.
The ENTSO-E shall publish data and information of TSOs from Contracting Parties on its website and include them on its platforms and data environments in the same manner as TSOs from the EU.
Energy sector stakeholders shall submit all required information and data to the ENTSO-E within a time period as required by the Decision in question, or as determined by the ENTSO-E.
The national enforcement authorities of the contracting parties shall cooperate with national enforcement authorities of the Member States, with the European Commission and with the Secretariat, for the purpose of ensuring that the competition and state aid rules are properly enforced especially, in cases potentially distorting competition or affecting trade across the borders between the contracting parties and EU members states.
Therefore, a Joint Committee shall be established which shall be composed of representatives of the European Commission, the Secretariat and the national competition and State aid enforcement authorities of the Contracting Parties.
Adoption and entry into force of legal package
Establishment of Capacity Calculation Regions
Imbalance Settlement Period of 15 min
Designation of NEMOs, proposal for a coordinated capacity calculation methodologies of new CCRs
Transposition of legal package by Contracting parties
Establishment of System Operation Regions
TSOs of Contracting Parties to adhere to imbalance netting and replacement reserves platforms, where applicable & all TSOs to apply the imbalance settlement period of 15 minutes
Proposal for common methodology for coordinated redispatching and countertrading and for common methodology for redispatching and countertrading cost sharing
Proposal for common capacity calculation methodology for long-term time frames
TSOs of Contracting Parties to adhere to platforms for frequency restoration reserves with manual and automatic activation
