On Tuesday 5 April, MEPs meeting in Strasbourg adopted by a large majority (410 votes in favour, 146 against and 72 abstentions) the provisional agreement between the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union on the revision of the Trans-European Energy Network (TEN-E) regulation (347/2013).
Dating from 2013, this regulation defines the criteria and selection process for the formation of the list of ‘projects of common interest (PCIs), which allows trans-European energy infrastructure projects (high voltage lines, gas pipelines, energy storage facilities etc) to benefit from advantages such as accelerated administrative processing and eligibility for EU funding under the ‘Connecting Europe Facility’ (CEF).
Its revision, launched on 15 December 2020 with the European Commission’s proposal (see EUROPE 12623/3), aims to bring the regulation more in line with the objectives of the European Green Deal.
The provisional agreement therefore provides for the exclusion of all oil projects from the scope of the Regulation.
Contrary to the Commission’s initial proposal, it keeps certain fossil gas projects within the scope of the regulation through controversial derogations (see EUROPE 12859/14, 12854/14).
In a debate after the vote, these derogations were again criticised by some MEPs, mainly from the Green/EFA group.
The agreement must now be formally adopted by the EU Council before the text can be published in the EU Official Journal and enter into force.
See the text of the agreement: https://bit.ly/3srCoco (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)