— last modified 21 February 2018
Today the European Parliament’s industry and energy committee (ITRE) adopted its position on the laws to redesign the EU?s electricity market.
MEPs strengthened the proposal from the European Commission. They voted in favour of stricter rules for capacity mechanisms, often used as backdoor subsidies for the most polluting and uneconomic power plants. In particular, they put the brakes on the possibility to use public money for investments in coal-fired power plants. They also decided that existing and small new renewable energy installations should keep their right to get priority over other, polluting energy sources on European electricity grids.
In reaction to the results of the vote, Wendel Trio, Director of Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe said:
“Today’s decision takes us one step closer to creating a market that is fit for renewables, instead of fossil fuels. With this position the European Parliament picked up the slack left by EU governments who opted for subsidising coal plants and undermining market access for renewables.
There is room for improvement in the Parliament’s position, both in ensuring priority access for all new renewables, and in fully eliminating all capacity mechanisms that function as hidden fossil fuel subsidies. If the EU wants to keep pace with the ongoing energy transition, the European Parliament’s position should be the bare minimum outcome of the upcoming negotiations with the Council and the Commission.”
