Gradual increase
While the draft directive, made available by Friends of the Earth Europe (FoEE), does not specify the precise percentage figures by which each member state will be required to increase its share of renewable energies, the following criteria are put forward:
- By 2014, each member state's share of renewables must be at least the amount it used in 2005 plus 51% of the 2020 target;
- by 2016, the figure must increase to 66% of the 2020 target; and;
- by 2018, member states should have achieved 83% of their 2020 target (compared to the 2005 level as usual).
For transport, member states should have achieved a 6.5% share of renewables by 2012.
Within the overall renewables and transport targets, member states must also set their own binding national targets for renewables use in heating and cooling, according to the draft.
Member states will also be responsible for issuing 'guarantees of origin' (GOs) to producers of heat and/or electricity from renewable energy sources. The GOs provide the Commission with a means of quantifying member states' progress towards their renewables targets.
Mandatory trading
The text contains a mechanism whereby member states are able, and even obliged, to obtain sufficient GOs by purchasing them from other member states.
If an EU country fails to reach its interim targets by 2014, 2016 or 2018, "the Commission may decide that such a member state must allow transfer from another member state of [GOs] issued to new entrants in other member states", the draft says.
The same member state must also "give the right to new entrants in other member states to benefit from its renewables support schemes in the same way as domestic producers of renewable energy".
Member states are allowed to refuse access to their domestic support schemes to new entrants in other member states if the new entrant "currently benefits, or has previously benefited, from a financial support system such as feed-in-tariffs", according to the draft.
