The reciprocity clause was inserted into the text of the Commission's third energy liberalisation package as an apparent response to fears that ownership unbundling - the separation of integrated energy firms' production assets from their transmission assets - would lead to the indiscriminate acquisition of EU energy grids by third countries (EurActiv 30/08/07).
"To protect the openness of our market, to protect the benefits that unbundling will bring, we need to place tough conditions on ownership of assets by non EU companies to make sure that we all play by the same rules," Commission President José Manuel Barroso said in a statement on 19 September, the day the Commission unveiled its new proposals.
Under the proposed clause, any company from a third country will have to "demonstrably and unequivocally comply with the same unbundling requirements as EU companies", according to the Commission's proposal.
A further clause stipulates that "third-country individuals and countries cannot acquire control over a Community transmission system or transmission system operator unless this is permitted by an agreement between the EU and the third country".
According to Christopher Jones, head of cabinet for Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, the clause, once adopted as law, would remove national competence in the area and require that any bilateral energy agreements with third countries are dealt with exclusively at Community level.
