European Energy Regulators’ views on regulating smarter transmission networks

摘要

The European Energy Regulators’ Group for Electricity and Gas (ERGEG) launched a publicconsultation on its position on smart grids on 17 December 2009. The consultation period ended on 1March 2010 and ERGEG published a Conclusions Paper, including an evaluation of commentsreceived, on 10 June 2010. This paper addresses the regulatory priorities highlighted by theconsultation that the development of smarter electricity networks will present. The focus of the paperis on transmission networks. It further explains the drivers behind the consultation, reviews the keyissues addressed and summarises the conclusions reached.The electricity supply sector will make a major contribution to achieving the targets of the EuropeanUnion with regard to energy. The development of smarter grids will help meet such targets and shouldhave a positive impact on the efficiency as well as on the quality and security of supply to the endusers. Investment in ‘smarter’ networks must provide better value for customers, including indirectbenefits such as diversification of supply.ERGEG understands the importance of regulatory stability and that it is a necessary pre-condition forthe significant investments that are expected in transmission and distribution networks. Further, theregulatory priorities identified by European Energy Regulators are (i) to focus on the performance ofnetwork companies in terms of the outputs delivered (so-called “output regulation”); (ii) to encourageinnovation while protecting consumers’ interests; and (iii) to encourage co-operation amongststakeholders, with special care to standardisation and to identify possible barriers to smart griddeployment.The European Energy Regulators’ recommendations include pursuing regulation of outputs as amechanism to ensure value for money paid by network users and investigating metrics for thequantification of the most important output effects and benefits at national level. This paper presents aselection of the potential output metrics for transmission networks which were identified for furtherevaluation in the ERGEG Conclusions Paper on Smart Grids.