Gas Supply: Greater transparency on the Danish gas market

On 1 June 2001, the Danish Parliament passed a Bill amending the Danish Natural Gas Supply Act. The Bill takes into account new EU requirements that might result from a coming amendment to the EU Gas Directive. This creates greater transparency in the natural gas area by introducing regulated access to the transmission network and requires unbundling of network and trade activities in separate companies. The Government thereby meets criticism of the lack of transparency in the Danish natural gas area because network and trade activities currently only have to be unbundled as far as concerns internal accounting of the gas companies. At the same time the provision of the Act concerning market opening are rendered more flexible so that a rapid market opening can be implemented without the need to further amend the Act.

In addition the Bill repeals the provisions of the Act concerning binding prices for resale to consumers without market access. The EU Commission’s civil servants have raised doubts as to whether these provisions comply with EU competition rules. In order to dispel this doubt, the provisions are being repealed.

Further information: René Frisdahl Jensen, Danish Energy Agency. Phone: +45 3395 4320. E-mail: rfj@ens.dk


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