The Secretariat’s Annual Implementation Report published today outlines the progress achieved by the Energy Community Contracting Parties in implementing the acquis communautaire under the Energy Community Treaty. The current state of implementation is marked by Albania, Kosovo*, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia and partially Ukraine having transposed the Third Energy Package. Bosnia and Herzegovina and former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia continue to fail in this endeavour, more than one and a half years after the transposition deadline set by the Ministerial Council.
Director of the Energy Community Secretariat, Mr Janez Kopač, said: “I am extremely delighted that six of the eight Contracting Parties have transposed the Third Energy Package, although Ukraine still has to do so in the electricity sector. This confirms their place in the Energy Union and puts them on par with EU Member States. The next step is to ensure effective and efficient implementation. For example, Third Energy Package Network Codes now need to be adopted in the Energy Community Contracting Parties and applied on the interconnection points on the interface between EU Member States and the Energy Community Contracting Parties. This will ensure equal treatment and thus remove one of the biggest obstacles to pan-European energy market integration.”
Dispute Settlement Procedures against Bosnia and Herzegovina and former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia for failure to transpose the Third Energy Package were initiated by the Secretariat in May 2016. “What is extremely worrying is that these two countries continue to persistently infringe also other provisions of the acquis,” underlined Deputy Director Dirk Buschle. “In spite of significant assistance by the Secretariat and the international community, Bosnia and Herzegovina still fails to comply even with the Second Energy Package in the gas sector, while former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia has postponed full electricity market opening by five years to 2020. Without doubt, it is the energy consumers who fall victim to the general political impasse in these two countries”. The dispute settlement cases will be decided by this year’s Energy Community Ministerial Council on 14 October in Sarajevo.
As regards the adoption of the sustainability acquis comprising energy efficiency, environment and renewables, it is Serbia and Montenegro who are the leaders. Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina have already surpassed their 2020 renewable energy targets, while Serbia and Albania are closely following their indicative pathway to reach the final target. Overall, transposition is the weakest in the sphere of energy efficiency, where several Contracting Parties are yet to transpose the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (Albania, Kosovo* and Ukraine) and Energy Services Directive (Albania and Ukraine).
The Annual Implementation Report covers the period from September 2015 to September 2016. It includes dedicated chapters on electricity, gas, oil, national regulatory authorities, renewable energy, energy efficiency, environment, competition and statistics.
Source: energy-community.org
