Brussels, 18/02/2011 (Agence Europe) - With four orders returned on17 January, the President of the General Court of the EU has lifted the temporary suspension of the decision of the European Commission authorising the Spanish regime of aid in favour of electricity production using domestic coal (EUROPE 10250).
The Commission authorised this aid, worth €800 million, to run until 31 December 2014 (EUROPE 10225), from the Spanish government for the implementation of the “preferential dispatch mechanism” (PDM). This mechanism obliges 10 power stations to buy domestic coal and to produce a certain volume of electricity from coal-fired generation, in order to provide temporary support to Spanish coal mines, which would otherwise have been threatened with closure in the short term. It reserves a share of the energy market for the electricity produced by these coal-fired power stations and provides compensation, through state aid, for the higher cost of this electricity. Three companies in the energy sector - Endesa, Gas Natural and Iberdrola - as well as the Autonomous Community of Galicia (Spain) requested urgent temporary suspension measures to annul the Commission's decision and the Court suspended them temporarily, to examine their requests.
In his order, the President of the General Court takes the view that these suspensive requests have foundation in law: the Commission should have carried out a formal investigation of the aid. The Court must therefore settle the question when it examines the actions to request the annulment of the decision. However, the requesting parties have not demonstrated the existence of circumstances which justify the urgent nature of the suspensive measures requested. As regards the interests at stake, the President believes that at first sight, the Commission's decision does not seem to contain any errors of appreciation as to the substance and that there is no reason for the interests invoked by the requesting parties to take priority over those of the coal-fired power stations, mining enterprises and the employees of these. As a result, he concludes that the interests pursued by implementing the Spanish service of general economic interest as quickly as possible and the associated compensation should take priority over the interests of the requesting parties. On this basis he rejected the request for temporary measures made by the Autonomous Community of Galicia and revoked the orders of 3 November 2010 temporarily suspending the Commission's decision. (F.G./transl.fl)