European Union countries have acknowledged that there are still “significant gaps in energy interconnections”, despite the progress made in recent years, a reality that “endangers the achievement of the bloc’s objectives of building a true energy union”, reports the EFE agency.
This fact is mentioned in a document adopted on Monday by 25 EU energy ministers – Hungary and Slovakia distanced themselves from the document – which also urges the European Commission to boost priority interconnection projects in corridors such as the one in the southwest of the bloc and to address technical, regulatory and financial issues to complete them.
This reference to interconnections is one of the points that Spain insisted on being included in the text approved shortly after the widespread power outage in the Iberian Peninsula on April 28, which is also mentioned in the text.
Specifically, the document emphasizes, following this episode, “the central role that energy plays in society and the need to guarantee the supply” of electricity.
“We await the conclusions of the current investigation, including the role that interconnections played during this incident and during the recovery phase,” the document says, according to Agerpres.
Improving interconnections between the Iberian Peninsula and France is one of the long-standing demands of Spain and Portugal, which, following the blackout, urged the European Commission and Paris, in separate letters, to accelerate work to improve the energy infrastructure planned for this part of the community block.
In this regard, EU members stressed the importance of increasing capacity and investing in “new cross-border energy interconnections” and “addressing significant and persistent discrepancies in energy prices” in European regions.
The 25 countries that supported the conclusions also noted “the importance of continuing on the path to achieving climate neutrality”, and stressed the need “to accelerate the deployment of clean energy and improve energy efficiency”.
These actions, they added, “will not only improve energy costs, but will also contribute to energy autonomy, reduce the EU’s dependence on fossil fuels and limit its exposure to price volatility”.
In this regard, the need to “create an enabling environment for clean energy technologies that contribute to climate neutrality”, including energy storage, is highlighted.
The text was not supported by all member states, as Hungary and Slovakia distanced themselves from it due to legislative proposals that the European Commission will present on Tuesday to ban European energy companies from signing new contracts for the purchase of Russian gas.
Brussels aims to end all Russian gas imports by the end of 2027 and will outline how it will do so on Tuesday, with a focus on companies that will have to terminate ongoing long-term contracts, such as Spain’s Naturgy.
Hungarian Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Peter Szijjarto justified his government’s position on social media, arguing that “energy policy is a national responsibility” and warning that plans to terminate Russian gas contracts “endanger the sovereignty and energy security” of his country.
“Given the escalation of events in the Middle East, we propose that such a plan should not even be put on the table,” Szijjarto said.