9th ELECPOR Meeting - "Clean Energy Package for European Consumers - Objectives and Proposals".

The Annual Conference organized by ELECPOR was held on November 3, 2017 in Lisbon, this time dedicated to the Clean Energy Package being debated in the European Union.

 

João Manso Neto, President of ELECPOR, mentioned the importance of the Clean Energy Package for the decarbonization policies and for the stability rules of the energy sector. However, the most negative aspect was the lack of emphasis on the need to adapt the marginal market to the structure of the new power generation plant, by means of adequate remuneration mechanisms that ensure the Available Capacity Guarantee, which in his opinion remain essential for the safety of the electrical system.

 

António Coutinho, Administrator of EDP Comercial, focused on the structure of tariffs, which is based on a greater weight of the variable component, creating imbalances, since the costs of the electric power system have a higher fixed than variable. It also focused on the increase in consumer prices in recent years, mainly due to the increase in taxes (+ 72%), as the network component rose by 25% to 30% and the energy sector grew little.

 

In the ensuing debate, moderated by Nascimento Batista, João Torres, Administrator of EDP Distribuição, welcomed the outstanding role that the Clean Energy Package gives, for the first time, to the distribution network operators (DSO), namely when it advocates creation of a European entity representing the interests of all European DSOs, like ENTSO-E, which is the entity representing the European transmission system operators. However, it disputes the proposal's position that DSOs can not have storage, as it is essential that the distributor responsible for the continuous supply of electricity has network management means to deal effectively with increasing volumes of production distributed.

 

Victor Baptista, Director of REN, raised doubts about the centralization that it is intended to impose on the creation of Regional Coordinating Centers, since each country knows the peculiarities of its system. It makes no sense for an operator located in a central European country to control flows in Portugal that are governed by their own particularities.

 

Júlia Seixas, Professor at FCT-UNL, said that the National Roadmap for Carbon Neutrality, which aims to achieve CO2 neutrality in the mid-21st century, is being launched. "What is the impact in Portugal?" was the question that the Teacher thinks will be answered when the Roadmap is drawn up.

 

Ana Quelhas, Director of Energy Planning at EDP, referred to Competitiveness, Supply Security and Decarbonization as the 3 main objectives of the Energy and Climate Package. Renewables are a key component as they contribute to the fulfillment of each of these objectives, which are complementary, with synergies between them. She also said that corrections to the carbon market price mechanism are necessary to promote competition and create the conditions for a real carbon penalty.

 

Stephen Woodhouse, Director of Poyry, said that the market is the great driver of competitiveness and, contrary to the position of João Torres, says that the storage to be installed in the distribution networks should be managed by private and never by the DSO. We need more transparency and less intervention from politicians, Poyry says.

 

João Torres and António Coutinho state that it is ultimately up to the Distribution company to guarantee the quality and continuity of the electricity supply, and therefore consider that the Clean Energy Package should not be so restrictive in prohibiting Distributors from owning but should leave the hypothesis open.

 

João Manso Neto closed the Conference reminding that next year will be the 10th ELECPOR Meeting, an oportunity to continue discussing topics of relevance to the energy sector.