DG Energy News

The surge in energy prices and high volatility seen since last autumn already triggered calls last year for reducing our dependence on energy imports. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has taken this debate further and prompted strategic EU policy changes.

Following up rapidly on the REPowerEU Communication and the Versailles Declaration, on 23 March the Commission set out ideas for collective European action to address the root causes of the problem in the gas market and ensure security of supply at reasonable prices for next winter and beyond.

In order to secure the EU's energy supply at affordable prices in the current geopolitical context and to phase out dependency on Russian gas, the European Commission has established with the Member States an EU Platform for the common purchase of gas, LNG and hydrogen.

The Commission will offer technical support to help 17 Member States phase out their reliance on Russian fossil fuels, in line with the REPowerEU plan for more affordable, secure and sustainable energy.

In 2021, the EU’s natural gas import dependency rate was 83%. This is 1 percentage point (pp) less than 2020 (84%). This small decrease in import dependency was significantly influenced by the fact that most EU Member States used stocks of natural gas that were imported in previous years.

The coal regions exchange programme has launched 6 exchanges between regions in the Western Balkans and their EU counterparts. These provide an opportunity to learn from each other’s experiences on moving away from coal as part of the clean energy transition.

On 12 April Commissioner for Energy, Kadri Simson, co-chaired with OPEC Secretary General Mohammad Sanusi Barkindo the 15th High-Level Meeting of the EU-OPEC Energy Dialogue in Vienna.

During their meeting on 25 March in Brussels, President Ursula von der Leyen and US President Joe Biden committed to working together to support Europe's energy security for the coming winters and to sustainably reduce Europe's energy dependency on Russia by investing in the clean energy transition.

The package contains an import ban on all forms of Russian coal. This affects one fourth of all Russian coal exports, amounting to around €8 billion loss of revenue per year for Russia.

The Commission is proposing new rules to make almost all physical goods on the EU market more friendly to the environment, circular, and energy efficient throughout their whole lifecycle from the design phase through to daily use, repurposing and end-of-life.

On 30 March, together with the proposal for a Sustainable Products Regulation, the Commission adopted the new ecodesign and energy labelling working plan 2022-2024. It strengthens the focus on the circularity aspects of ecodesign and labelling requirements for energy-related products and tyres.

More than 220 million buildings in Europe date from before 2001. Older buildings are much less efficient at retaining warmth and as a result, 75% of the EU’s building stock leaks energy. To address this, as part of the European Green Deal, the EU aims to give around 35 million buildings across Europe an energy facelift.