EU readies criteria for recognizing Energy Community’s guarantees of origin

A roadmap is being finalized to allow guarantees of origin from the contracting parties of the Energy Community to be recognized in the European Union. The roadmap sets a list of criteria the parties including Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia have to meet.

The proposal of the roadmap was prepared by the European Commission, then the contracting parties of the Energy Community sent their comments and now the commission is reviewing them, and at the same time seeking the opinion of its member states, said Naida Taso, renewable energy expert from the Secretariat of the Energy Community.

After the commission finalizes the roadmap, the Ministerial Council of the Energy Community will adopt it and its implementation can begin.

The Ministerial Council could adopt a decision at the end of this year, and if it doesn’t happen then, then at the next meeting, at the end of next year, Tasso said at the SEE Energy Day 2024 conference in Belgrade, organized by Montel.

EU regulations don’t allow the recognition of guarantees of origin from non-EU countries

The roadmap, in her words, is necessary because the EU Renewable Energy Directive (RED II) doesn’t allow the recognition of guarantees of origin from non-EU countries.

She noted that the Secretariat has launched an initiative to establish a regional system for guarantees of origin with the aim of developing nine registries for the contracting parties in line with EU rules: Albania, the two entities making up Bosnia and Herzegovina (the Federation of BiH and the Republic of Srpska), Georgia, Kosovo*, North Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, and Ukraine.

So far, Albania, Georgia and the Republic of Srpska have launched registries, and yesterday Montenegro signed an agreement. However, the good implementation of the initiative is not enough for guarantees of origin to be recognized in the EU due to RED II, she added.

Four groups of criteria

Tasso stressed that she cannot talk about all the details of the roadmap, but she said that there are four groups of criteria.

They refer to EU regulations, including RED II, the electricity integration package, the application of EU rules for guarantees of origin in third countries, and the functioning of the Energy Community’s regional system of guarantees of origin.

For example, Serbia has been issuing guarantees of origin for a long time and is a member of the European Association of Issuing Bodies (AIB), but its guarantees cannot be traded in the EU, Tasso said.

Serbia currently meets only one group of criteria.

The next steps are a decision on the roadmap by the Ministerial Council, then the fulfillment of the criteria, which must be evaluated by the European Commission, for each contracting party, and then entry into the EU system, Tasso said.