Energy giants back European Commission proposals to limit subsidies for polluting power plants
Thirteen industry leaders, including Statoil, Siemens, Shell and Iberdrola, launch joint initiative to set emissions cap for new energy capacity
Some of Europe’s most powerful players in the energy sector joined forces yesterday to launch a new drive to set an emissions cap for future energy projects that benefit from public subsidies.
The Make Power Clean campaign is backed by 13 companies and organisations, including high profile names such as Shell, Statoil, Siemens and Total.
It is calling on EU countries and MEPs to endorse a European Commission proposal to set an emissions limit on new power plants that receive government subsidies for providing stand-by capacity to the grid.
The cap, suggested at 550 grams of CO2 per kWh, would in effect exclude coal from receiving capacity mechanism subsidies within the EU – although the group insists the proposals are technology neutral with more polluting plants free to pay for their emissions under the Emissions Trading Scheme.
“Our electricity bills should not support the operation of the most polluting power plants, given that cleaner supply options are available,” the coalition said in a letter sent to MEPs earlier this year. “This would clearly contradict EU climate and energy policy objectives and would go against the best interest of European consumers.”
The proposal is part of a package of reforms announced by the European Commission in November, which also includes measures to promote greater grid flexibility and faster deployment of renewable energy.
If the measures are passed by the European Parliament it could mean major changes for the administration of national capacity market schemes.
In the UK for example, coal and biomass plants drew nearly 10.5GW of contracts, or 19 per cent of the market, at February’s capacity auction.
Meanwhile, there has been widespread criticism of the practice of handing subsidies to back-up diesel power plants that deliver some of the most carbon intensive power on the grid. The government has indicated that it wants to tackle such plants through tighter air pollution rules, but campaigners have argued more urgent steps are required to stop the most polluting projects benefiting from the capacity market.
