EU grids package hasn’t electrified stakeholders, more investment needed

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For years, stakeholders in the electricity sector have waited for the European Commission to unveil its grids package for solving the many gaps in the system and the problems getting investment into the right projects. It finally arrived in December, and now that it’s here, it has been broadly welcomed. But there is disagreement about how some of the suggested provisions are going to work.

On 16 March, EU energy ministers held a rancourous debate on the proposal and significant divisions emerged. The package aims to strengthen cross-border electricity infrastructure, accelerate permitting procedures and improve the resilience of the EU energy system. But Sweden’s energy minister Ebba Busch strongly objected to the proposal’s provisions on congestion revenue and grid planning, and threatened to freeze new power connections with EU neighbours unless the rules are changed.

She said that because Sweden was such an early leader in renewables, it collects a “massive amount of congestion revenues,” and that if it were forced to share that revenue with other countries, as proposed, it would punish them for having invested in renewables. Other countries could then be seen as free riders, benefiting from others’ work.

Her comments were still being discussed the next day at a stakeholder event in Brussels about the grids package at the Polish Permanent Representation to the EU.

EU Grid Congestion Map (2024) | Source: ACER