Montenegro takes legislative lead on cross-border energy infrastructure reform

Read the full article here.

The Energy Community said that Montenegro has become its first contracting party to transpose the Trans-European Networks for Energy (TEN-E) regulation, thus supporting integrated and interconnected energy systems, strengthening energy security, and fostering market competition across the Energy Community region.

The procedure was completed after the Montenegrin parliament ratified last week the law on cross-border energy infrastructure projects, which transposes the main elements of the TEN-E framework. Next, Montenegro will further specify in the next six months the specific provisions related to the permit-granting process, the manual of procedures, public participation and transparency for cross-border energy infrastructure projects, the Energy Community said in a statement on Thursday.

"This represents Montenegro’s second major legislative milestone in just one month towards deeper regional and EU energy market integration," said the Energy Community which which supports EU neighbours toward membership of the bloc through full implementation of the EU energy law. In February, Montenegro became the third contracting party, after Serbia and Moldova, to transpose the Electricity Integration Package.

As a result, the Energy Community initiated on March 3 the compliance verification process on the transposition of the package, marking the start of the technical assessment required to advance towards electricity market coupling with the EU prior to accession. This assessment shall be completed in three months.

Source: Wikipedia