Since 2013, there has been a significant gap between the financial and human resources requested by the management of the European Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER) and those actually allocated to the Agency from the EU's general budget, according to a study commissioned by the European Parliament and presented to its Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) on Tuesday 27 October.
Conducted by the consulting firm Trinomics, the study estimates the gap at 26% for financial resources and 31% for personnel between 2013 and 2020.
Although it is not uncommon for EU agencies to get less resources than they ask for, the gap in the case of ACER was “very important”, the paper notes.
Pointing to several explanatory factors, Trinomics points out that the agency's resource requirements appear to have been underestimated in relation to the increase in its workload since its creation in March 2011.
While its initial mission is to ensure cooperation between National Regulatory Authorities (NRAs) to foster the integration and completion of the European internal energy market for electricity and natural gas, ACER's responsibilities have been strengthened over the years.
In particular, since the entry into force of the EU Regulation (1227/2011) on the integrity and transparency of the wholesale energy market (REMIT) at the end of 2011, it plays a key role in monitoring the behaviour of market participants in the electricity and gas markets, in order to strengthen and ensure effective and fair competition in these markets.
The Agency also has new tasks under the Trans-European Energy Network (TEN-E) Regulation (such as formulating an opinion on projects to be included in the lists of projects of common interest), the Regulation on security of gas supply and the Clean Energy for All Europeans package.
A second reason put forward by Trinomics is the considerable increase in the number of appeals and appeal decisions. The number of appeals filed with the ACER Board of Directors has thus risen from two in 2015 to eight in the first 8 months of 2020.
Finally, the study notes that there may have been differences of interpretation of ACER's specific roles between the Agency's management and the EU institutions.
This lack of financial and human resources has led the Agency to omit, delay or cancel certain tasks, according to the study, in particular with regard to data collection and processing, as well as market surveillance.
However, overall the Agency's activities are carried out efficiently and there does not appear to be any major ‘overlap’ with NRAs or other EU organisations.
Nevertheless, anticipating that its responsibilities could increase further in the coming years, the study considers that in view of the benefits generated by the Agency, “it seems appropriate to award ACER resources to the full extent of its request”.
See the study: https://bit.ly/31N569u (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)