The Business Wind Association (AEE) has expressed its most categorical rejection of the proposal of the Xunta de Galicia of force to sell 50% of the energy generated by wind installations to exclusively Galician companies via PPAs.
This was reported by the wind energy sector, which warned that this proposal “goes against the European Union electricity market legislationcompetition rules and the law on the electricity sector. Any intervention by a liberalized market is an attack on fundamental rights who govern in the Galician autonomous community itself, in Spain and in Europe.
Instability for businesses
The association emphasizes that Galicia needs “regulatory stability and legal certainty” and adds that this new announcement “aggravates the situation of instability for businesses”.
The wind energy sector demands that common sense and compliance with current national and European legislation prevail, emphasizing that “force wind developers to sell 50% of their energy to SMEs and businesses Galician “violates the rules of competition and the free market.”
Likewise, they warn that this measure “would lead negative consequences for the economic development of the regionand could even increase the price of electricity for consumers.
International sanctions
They warn that if the measure succeeds, it would involve international sanctions and trigger international arbitrations, and would force them to break contracts that developers had already signed with consumersgenerating judicialization throughout the sector.
Other reasons for this rejection of PREPA relate to the fact that There are companies that are already committing all their energy via PPAs with manufacturers until beyond 2030, and that “an autonomous law can in no case contradict a state law, even less a European law”.
The sector expresses its concern over the proposal of the Xunta de Galicia to sell energy to community companies violating, among other things, legal aspects such as the configuration of electricity production as a liberalized and free activity (article 2, Law 24/2013 of the electrical sector – LSE) and the impact on the principle of freedom of enterprise (article 38 – Spanish Constitution). At this point, they caution that “the ESA is a fundamental law of the state.”
Violation of rights
Furthermore, they claim that the Electricity Sector Law clearly establishes that those who act in the production market “They can freely agree on the terms of electricity purchase and sale contracts. that they subscribe.
The Wind Business Association emphasizes that with this proposal “violates the right to freedom of establishment in accordance with the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU) by requiring a company to sell 50% of its electricity to a specific group of consumers.
To argue against this decision, it is argued that the preamble to Directive 2019/944 states that “only a fully open internal market which allows all suppliers freely supplying its customers, is compatible with the freedoms“.
Without limitations or restrictions
Furthermore, they point out that Article 3.4 of Directive 2019/944 is violated, which specifies that “Member States will ensure that certain level playing field and so that the rules, tariffs and treatments applied to electricity companies are transparent, proportionate and non-discriminatory.
The wind sector insists that the most efficient way and the one required in Europe to get a better price for buyers and sellers It is “with market mechanisms, without limitations, restrictions or orientations towards certain consumers or groups”.
For the AEE, the effects of this new energy sales initiative from the Xunta would be a distortion in the setting of market prices, “which would ultimately harm other domestic or industrial consumers. This initiative, in addition to paralyzing investments by developers in Galicia, could end up making electricity more expensive for part of the population.
“De facto expropriation”
They admit that they do not know if the intentions of the Xunta with this proposal are to also apply this obligation to existing parks, a fact that, if this happened, would be classified as “serious“.
The wind sector advances by affirming that “this de facto expropriation would imply a violation of current legislation and would force the termination of contracts, increase the price of electricity, activate demands from international investors generating new arbitrations, in addition to consequent sanctions from the European Commission.
