Protecting consumers from soaring electricity prices and allowing suppliers to have predictable income, these are the two objectives set out by the European Commission. This Tuesday, March 14, Brussels presented ways to reform the European energy market. Without completely overhauling it, it intends to develop long-term energy contracts, which would have the merit of smoothing consumer bills and encouraging investment in renewable energies. Thus, fluctuations in the gas market, on which electricity directly depends, would have less effect on prices, which exploded with the war waged by Russia in Ukraine.
Nuclear power as a point of tension
Also, Brussels wants to facilitate the deployment of electricity purchase contracts between private players, on the basis of a price decided in advance, which would allow companies to benefit from “more stable prices for the production of energy renewable and non-fossil”, in his words. And as the States should establish public guarantee schemes to cover the credit risks of buyers, many companies could take out this type of contract. Another measure, which already exists in the French renewables sector, will also be discussed by the Member States: these are “contracts for difference”, which provide that the electricity producer pays back the gains if the price is higher high, and that, on the contrary, he receives financial compensation in the event of a drop.
This proposal is therefore not a revolution, as France and Spain wanted. The latter hoped that Brussels would propose to achieve a strict cutting of gas and electricity prices. But most of the other member states, in particular Germany, did not want systemic reform “in a hurry”. If she won her case on this point, that of nuclear power could annoy her, because the European Commission intends to include this energy in its reform. For the greatest happiness of France. This Tuesday, the president of the Union of energy-using industries in France, Nicolas de Warren, described the European Commission’s announcements as a “happy surprise”.