Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-07-04-Speech-1-163"
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"en.20050704.21.1-163"2
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".
Mr President, I am sorry the Council is not here tonight.
I commend this proposal to the House.
I wish to begin by thanking my colleagues in the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy for their cooperation in the work on this report and on this proposal, which has enabled us to come before Parliament with a clear and united position. I also wish to compliment the Council on working with us in informal trialogue towards an agreement at first reading.
Picking up on the comments of Commissioner Piebalgs, whom I naturally welcome here this evening, I should like to console the Commission for the way in which we and the Council have cut back its text and therefore some of the proposed powers that were envisaged, which we deem unnecessary.
When it came to us originally, this proposal reflected a certain element of split personality, because it addressed physical security of supply – keeping the lights on, and investment in infrastructure – but also market measures aimed at the same thing. It is not possible to underestimate the importance of energy in general and electricity in particular to our way of life, to our quality of life and to our standard of living. It is a vital element in a modern society and economy. Consequently, it is ironic that Parliament has chosen to put this item of primary legislation as the last item on Monday evening, although, naturally, I hope that we have saved the best until last for your edification.
Security of supply is about keeping the lights on. It must be admitted that we had quite a debate with the Council about whether to include a definition of security of supply in this proposal and, if so, what that definition should be. I am glad to say that we have prevailed and that a definition has been included in Article 2.
The question arises: how does this directive help address security of supply – keeping the lights on, avoiding blackouts and outages – and what have we in the European Parliament added to it? The objectives are quite clear: it is about establishing measures to safeguard security of supply and ensure proper functioning of the internal market – these two elements of the proposal. It is about ensuring adequate generation capacity, an adequate balance between supply and demand and appropriate levels of interconnection. That is referred to quite clearly in the text.
Then we in Parliament have insisted on the definition of the roles and responsibilities of a full list of players – stakeholders, if you will – in the electricity supply industry. We have sought to make Member States define those roles in the cause of security of supply so that everybody knows who is responsible for what. That includes Member States themselves. We have achieved the inclusion of a requirement for a report on overall system adequacy for operational network security for the projected security balance of supply and demand over the next five years and prospects for the security of electricity supply over the next 15 years beyond that, thereby flagging up what investment requirements will be needed. We can also claim credit for slimming down the original proposal and giving it more focus.
This directive will not guarantee that there will be no more blackouts: that would be impossible. But it points out where responsibility rests and it will be for Member States to spell that out in detail so there is no uncertainty.
Primary operational responsibility must be with the transmission system operators and, to some extent, the distribution system operators. But we should all recognise that a whole range of factors are involved in maintaining overall security of supply, not just transmission and interconnection. We must remember that the primary responsibility for that at present rests with the Member States."@en1
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