Directorate of Energy Markets and Security

2010

Notes: Rankings are based on absolute capacities and production; per-capita rankings would be quite different for many categories. 1 Renewables power capacity figures rounded to nearest 5 GW. Renewables power capacity (including only small hydro) counts small hydro < 10 MW; this is a change from prior versions of this report. Capacity figures would be higher for other definitions of small hydro with higher limits. Excluding small hydro entirely, rounded capacity figures would be 160 GW, 195 GW, and 245 GW, for years 2007 through 2009, respectively. 2 Feed-in policies total for 2009 also includes early 2010. 3 Solar hot water/heating numbers are for 2008. Many figures in the above table and throughout the report are rounded to two significant digits, so some totals may not exactly reflect underlying data due to rounding. * Small-scale wind systems are generally considered to include turbines that produce enough power for a single home, farm, or small business. The American Wind Energy Association, for example, defines "small-scale" as less than 100 kW, but size can vary according to needs and/or laws of a country or state. * Output per unit of capacity is declining as the share of heat pumps (which have a relatively low capacity factor) rises. This is due to the fact that heat pumps generally have fewer load hours than other uses. Heat use is estimated with a coefficient of performance of 3.5.

Disclaimer: REN21 issue papers and reports are released by REN21 to emphasise the importance of renewable energy and to generate discussion of issues central to the promotion of renewable energy. While REN21 papers and reports have benefited from the considerations and input from the REN21 community, they do not necessarily represent a consensus among network participants on any given point. Although the information given in this report is the best available to the authors at the time, REN21 and its participants cannot be held liable for its accuracy and correctness.

Abstract The confluence of energy and climate policies has led to a tense situation where the traditional liberalization process is being progressively combined with the interventions and measures towards a low carbon economy . This new framework reveals the shift from a regulatory programme targeted at opening the energy market put in place in a decade of “energy packages” to a priority task of decarbonisation. At the same time it reveals that the liberalisation policy pursued by the Commission is in conflict with a stark increase in national policies and measures largely aimed at achieving climate change mitigation goals through the implementation of new technologies such as renewables. A turning point in designing the relations between the EU Commission and the Member States is article 194 of the Lisbon Treaty. Tension between the idea of a common Union approach and a national approach based on the interests of individual states emerges. Hence MS are allowed to retain strong rights in energy. Their ‘sovereignty’ over their resources and national energymix is acknowledged. In literature often energy is seen as an area of shared competences as stated under article 4 of the TFEU and detailed in the specific article on energy. However both the interpretation of article 194 and the written text of the same seem to evoke a different allocation of the competences at EU and national level. Therefore this paper argues that the competences in energy are allocated according to an ‘intersecting’ structure where they are to be put together like pieces of a puzzle. The need for a ‘box’ where the objectives promoted by the Commission and the MSs’ divergent interests can meet is behind the proposal of an Energy Union which arose, rather unexpectedly, when the 2014 crisis of Russia’s annexation of Crimea pushed energy concerns to the top of the list of priorities. The strategy of the Energy Union is an attempt to reconcile divergent goals: on the one side, the EU’s more than ten-year policy of liberalisation for a fully integrated energy market and, on the other, the new imperative to achieve specific outcomes of emission reductionthanks to interventions in the energy market. While the liberalisation process has been implemented on a common track to remove state monopolies for a more open and integrated market, the decarbonisation policies are undertaken by national governments with sole regard to their own needs. Such a counter-trend can result in a sort of re-nationalisation of the energy market and in deep distortions of the internal market. The proposal for a revised Renewable Energy Directive, providing for a framework to achieve the 2030 renewable target, aims at integrating renewable energies in the market and ensuring “utmost coherence” of the policy proposals. Even though in the Energy Union the Commission is pushing towards a higher level of integration, the effective convergence of national policies would require a different structure of article 194 Tfue and centralized competences in the Commission’s hands. On these premises, the ‘Winter Package’ reframes energy policies and the regulatory system and represents a compromise between instruments steering the market and decentralized initiatives. In fact the lack of a project of governance was “the hole” in the heart of the Energy Union plan. The paper will point out that this project is an attempt to coordinate the institutional design for decarbonisation with the well-established regulatory scheme. Therefore this model of governance outlines new modes of dialogue between the Commission and MS based on direct relationships where the Commission is at the centre collecting initiatives towards common outcomes. Such a coordinating structure seems to refer to the “hub and spoke” model. Its advantageous feature is that all the entities may cooperate, even if with different roles. The reframing of the relationships in the decarbonising policies is developing, on the regulatory side, thanks to the ongoing presence of national regulators cooperating within Acer as confirmed in the proposal of regulation recast.

Gazi Kitabevi, 2024

2008

Energy has risen to the top of policy agendas around the world. There is now widespread recognition that energy policy has become key to international security, economic development, and the environmental sustainability of modern civilization. Yet this importance is not reflected in the world's institutional infrastructure for managing global problems. A handful of international organizations work in uncoordinated fashion on various pieces of the energy puzzle. No organizational infrastructure exists to support the global conversation that is now badly needed about how to move the world onto a sustainable path that provides appropriate, reliable, and affordable energy services.

The World Energy Council is the principal impartial network of energy leaders and practitioners promoting an affordable, stable and environmentally sensitive energy system for the greatest benefit of all. Formed in 1923, the Council is the UNaccredited global energy body, representing the entire energy spectrum, with over 3,000 member organisations in over 90 countries, drawn from governments, private and state corporations, academia, NGOs and energy stakeholders. We inform global, regional and national energy strategies by hosting high-level events including the World Energy Congress and publishing authoritative studies, and work through our extensive member network to facilitate the world's energy policy dialogue.

Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Affordable and Clean Energy (Springer), 2019

Energy use is central to almost every aspect of life and development, and to the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). But energy resource endowments and availability are not evenly distributed across the world, creating or exacerbating inequalities and poverty. Energy is also the greatest contributor to anthropogenic climate change and its consequences. SDG 7 sets out to ensure affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all. How the goals of SDG 7 will be advanced, by whom, where, when, and to what level of success, are in part influenced by the structure, actors, rules, content and processes that collectively make up the field of Global Energy Governance (GEG) and its nascent sub-field Global Sustainable Energy Governance (GSEG). This article provides an introduction and general orientation to the emerging and expanding field of GEG and in particular GSEG so as to: (i) understand the history and conceptual basis of GEG, including in the context of the global energy transition and SDG 7; (ii) appreciate underlying imperatives and intersecting issues within the frame of GSEG; and (iii) identify and describe the categories and functions of selected global and regional state and non-state actors and frameworks within the GSEG matrix that are involved in shaping, directing and implementing the energy transition and SDG 7.

2018

I provided feedback on this renewable energy policy report. Renewables have progressed at an unprecedented pace over the past decade and have consistently surpassed expectations, with new records being set each year and an increasing number of countries committing to their respective energy transitions. Much of the advancement has been achieved thanks to effective policies and planning, coupled with ambitious targets. However, to meet the goals established in the Paris Agreement, the pace of the energy transitions will have to increase – and for this, policies enabling a rapid renewable energy deployment will be essential. Policy support for renewables continues to be focused primarily on power generation globally, with efforts in the heating and cooling and the transport sectors significantly lagging behind. In the future, policy frameworks need to take a systems approach with more fully integrated policies across sectors, incorporating supporting infrastructure and measures for balancing supply and demand, taking advantage of synergies with energy efficiency, and harnessing distributed renewables for increased access to electricity and clean cooking. Above all, policies should be stable and transparent. Though many challenges remain, not least among them the continued subsidies for fossil fuels, more sophisticated policies continue to stimulate and support the increasing uptake of renewable energy worldwide. The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the International Energy Agency (IEA), and the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century (REN21) have joined forces to produce a new publication, Renewable Energy Policies in a Time of Transition, in a first collaboration of this nature. This publication aims to provide policymakers with a comprehensive understanding of the diverse policy options to support the development of renewables across sectors, technologies, country contexts, energy market structures, and policy objectives. It not only illustrates the changing landscape of policies for renewable energy in power, heating and cooling, and transport, but also highlights the importance of system integration and sector coupling, reflecting the expanding opportunities for integration with increasing renewable energy deployment.