European Commission

The potential for energy efficiency and renewable energy in Ukraine is “huge”. That’s the view of Maros Sefcovic, European Commission Vice President for Energy Union. During a visit to Kyiv, Ukraine, he said the Commission is prepared to support the establishment of the Energy Efficiency Fund before the end of the year. Mr Sefcovic said: […]

EU renewable energy targets will not be achieved unless they are backed-up by a monitoring and enforcement mechanism which guarantees the agreement is in progress to be fulfilled. That’s the suggestion of the The House of Lords EU Committee which stated the mechanism should also ensure Member States live up to their own commitments and share […]

An investigation to see whether ethanol producers have changed the benchmarks published by a price reporting agency has been launched. If found guilty they will have breached EU antitrust rules. Ethanol is an alcohol made from biomass which is mainly added to gasoline and used as a biofuel for certain motor vehicles. The companies being […]

The European Commission has launched 195 infrastructure projects worth €5.35 billion (£3.8bn) to help the EU reach its energy and climate goals. It includes 108 electricity, 77 gas, seven oil and three smart grids projects. The aim is to integrate Europe’s energy markets and diversify sources. One of the electricity projects aims to end the isolation […]

The European Commission is taking Greece to the Court of Justice over poor wastewater treatment again. The country was previously found guilty in 2004 and still hasn’t addressed the problem, the Commission said. It states the lack of adequate treatment systems in the area of Thriasio Pedio poses risks to human health, inland waters and the marine […]

The European Commission has launched two separate investigations into the French power market. The first will look into the country-wide capacity mechanism – which offers incentives to electricity providers on top of income obtained by selling power on the market. These rewards might have an impact on competition in the internal electricity market and have to be assessed under […]

River floods in Europe could cost up to €100 billion annually by 2080. They would also affect nearly one million people. A new study by the European Commission stated under high levels of global warming and extreme climate scenarios the costs would increase to an estimated €40 billion by just 2050 and affect more than […]

The European Commission has approved plans to grant around €10 million (£8m) of public investment to the operator of a gasification plant in Finland. The Vaskiluodon Voima Oy facility will convert forest biomass into gas for electricity generation and district heating instead of using coal. It will replace between 25% and 40% of the coal […]

The European Commission needs new powers to ensure Member States meet the EU’s 2030 renewable targets. That’s according the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) which states the Commission should have renewable energy benchmarks by December 2015. These should provide an indication for Member States on what their targets are and should be distributed fairly among the countries. […]

A new initiative has helped reduce energy use by 30% in university buildings across Europe. The three-year ‘SMART CAMPUS’ project aimed to achieve energy savings of up to 20% by changing users’ behaviour in non-residential university campuses. Funded by the European Commission, the project used Enoro’s computer software ‘GENERIS’ which collected energy usage data from pilot campuses and […]