Energy efficiency plan hanging in the balance
The future of an EU action plan on energy efficiency that was due to be adopted this Wednesday, has been thrown into doubt after European commission president Jose Manuel Barroso raised last-minute concerns.
The action plan is intended to set out the policies and measures required over six years to achieve the EU’s goal of reducing energy consumption 20 per cent by 2020 (EED 20/09/06). As drafted by the commission’s energy directorate, these include revisions to existing EU legislation and new energy savings targets for sectors such as transport.
News of Mr Barroso’s intervention is spreading ripples of alarm. According to a source in the council of ministers, Mr Barroso is worried that the plan and the actions it proposes are too technical and bureaucratic, and will fail to register with citizens. More fundamentally, he questions whether a separate action plan on energy efficiency is necessary at all.
While there is still a possibility that the plan could emerge after a short delay, there is also a strong chance that it will be dropped entirely, with actions on energy efficiency instead being subsumed into a wider energy strategy – 'including nuclear and fossil fuels', according to one stakeholder - as part of the common EU energy policy expected early next year (EED 15/03/06).
The high level of uncertainty surrounding the future of the plan reflects the fact that the last word now rests with the commission president, who has yet to make a final decision.
Energy commissioner Andris Piebalgs has repeatedly described energy efficiency as his main priority (see separate article, this edition). Although his spokesperson sought to play down the significance of the delay, behind the scenes Mr Piebalgs is fighting to save the action plan. 'Piebalgs’ point was that energy efficiency was being forgotten. Now the energy supply lobby is winning back the agenda', one aggrieved stakeholder told ENDS.
A decision by the commission to shelve the document entirely would lead many to question its commitment to energy efficiency, and raise concerns over the influence of power industry lobbyists in the decision. Andrew Warren of European energy efficient buildings lobby EuroAce told ENDS that such a move would send the signal that a key energy policy priority for the commission 'has suddenly diminished in importance'.
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