Schikking in rechtszaak over toegang US Gas op Franse en Duitse gasnetwerken (en)

The European Commission's DG Competition has decided to close its investigation into the alleged refusal by the French and German gas companies Gaz de France and Ruhrgas to grant the Norwegian subsidiary of the US gas producer Marathon access to their gas networks. Both companies have offered commitments to improve third party access to their respective transport networks in order to allow customers in France and Germany to benefit more effectively from the opening of the gas markets to competition.

Commenting on the settlement of the case, the Commissioner in charge of competition, Mr. Mario Monti said: "I am particularly pleased that these settlements with Gaz de France and Ruhrgas will allow us to finally close the Marathon case. These settlements include important improvements to the functioning of European gas markets and show that competition policy complements and reinforces sector specific legislation. Effective access to gas transport networks is essential for the introduction of competition on the European gas markets to the benefit of industrial users and ultimately the consumers. I call upon Gaz de France, Ruhrgas and other gas network operators across Europe, in cooperation with the national authorities, to continue their efforts to create effective Third Party Access regime."

After long parallel negotiations with the Commission services, Gaz de France and Ruhrgas have made commitments to improve third party access to their respective gas transport networks and to enhance customers' possibilities to benefit from the liberalisation of the gas markets. These commitments reflect the market situation in each country and are therefore not identical. They will remain in force for several years and their fulfilment will be monitored by a trustee who will regularly report to DG Competition.

The commitments go beyond the provisions introduced by the new gas directive which is to be transposed into national law by 1st July 2004. However, they are not to be understood as a maximum standard. Indeed, the Commission has proposed a regulation on conditions for access to the gas transmission networks (see IP/03/1694 of 10 December 2003).

The commitments will contribute to a better functioning of the gas transport markets in France and Germany. This has led the Commission services to close the file.

Commitments by Gaz de France

Gaz de France's proposal will allow the less well placed French customers, either by reason of the quality of gas they use or their geographical location, to benefit from the liberalisation of the gas market. Until now, only the high calorific value (H) gas customers located close to the northern and eastern borders of France were able to benefit from the opening up of the gas market in France.

During the negotiations with Gaz de France on the proposed commitments, the Commission services co-operated closely with the French Energy Regulator (CRE). CRE plays a very active role in the French market and will continue to monitor Gaz de France's access regime.

The main commitments made by Gaz de France are as follows:

• There will be a gradual reduction in the number of tariff and balancing zones on which the entry/exit transport system is based in France. In January 2005 the present seven zones will be reduced to four. Gaz de France has also offered to implement an investment programme to reduce congestion on the network, which should make it possible to have only two zones by January 2009. This will facilitate access for new entrants by reducing the cost of transport connected with the crossing of several zones.

• Starting in January 2005, the transport division of Gaz de France will offer operators, on a transparent and non-discriminatory basis for operators, the possibility to convert H gas into L gas. CRE will be consulted when this offer is made. Low calorific value (L) gas users, which constitute a sizeable proportion of the French market, will thus be given greater access to competing gas.

• For three years starting in January 2005, Gaz de France undertakes to implement a gas release programme in southern France where today there is no competition. The duration of this commitment takes into account the completion of new infrastructure already programmed in southern France and which, when operational, should make it easier for competitors to enter the Southern part of the French market. The practical details of the gas release arrangement were negotiated by Gaz de France with CRE, which will also oversee the application of the programme

  See http://www.cre.fr/

In addition to these principal commitments, Gaz de France will also be taking a number of measures to improve transparency, handling of requests for access to the network and congestion management. It has for instance undertaken to put in place, from 1st July 2004, an optional daily balancing service which will even out all or some of the customer's imbalance resulting from its transport contract as part of the offer of access to storage for third parties; in January 2005 it will offer the possibility of booking daily transport capacity; it will develop the recently established secondary market in transport capacity; and it will reduce the capacity reservations done by the trading division of Gaz de France until another method of capacity allocation in the event of congestion has not been introduced with the agreement of CRE.

For more information, interested parties could consult Gaz de France's web pages in the near future.

In response to requests from CRE, Gaz de France has recently improved its access regime, or will do so in 2004, as regards transparency and handling of requests for access and the access to LNG terminals.

Commitments by Ruhrgas.

The main commitments by Ruhrgas are the following:

• Ruhrgas will abolish the previous regime under which capacity reservations had to respect the fictitious contractual path between the point where the gas is entered into the system and the point where the gas is withdrawn from the system (so-called « Vertragspfadmodell ». The new regime will allow customers to book gas transport capacities separately at entry and exit points without booking any capacity between the two points. Customers will also be able to book across tariff and quality zones - high (H) and low (L) calorific gas - throughout Germany. Ruhrgas will continue not to charge any quality adaptation fees, except for conversion between H and L-gas, as long as the flexibility in the system allows it to do so.

• As regards its tariff regime, Ruhrgas will introduce as a starting point - 6 tariff zones (4 H-gas zones : Northern Germany, Central Germany, South East Germany, South West Germany, and 2 L-gas zones). For transports across several tariff zones, Ruhrgas will charge a fee on a causation basis (no so-called "pancaking"). Ruhrgas will progressively reduce the number of zones, from 6 to 5 in May 2005 and to 4 in May 2006.

• Ruhrgas will extend the new entry/exit regime beyond its own network. To this end, Ruhrgas will include Ferngas Nordbayern, in which it holds a majority stake, into its entry/exit system and will offer the same to other regional transmission companies, in which it holds a minority stake (Gas-Union, Saar-Ferngas, MVV Energie, HEAG and Erdgasversorgung Thüringen-Sachsen - EVG).

• The size of the tariff zones is at the same time the size of the balancing areas that Ruhrgas allows its customers to create. The balancing areas will help suppliers to avoid situations of imbalances, which can result in significant financial penalties. The creation of balancing areas will thus allow shippers to be more competitive in Ruhrgas' transmission area.

• In order to avoid any imbalances Ruhrgas will offer online balancing services, which allow transport customers to have a fully balanced injection and withdrawal of gas in the Ruhrgas network. This online balancing service merely requires that the customer to whom the gas is delivered has the appropriate technical equipment to measure the gas flows. As a source of flexible supply the user of the Ruhrgas network can either use flexible supply contracts or gas stored in Ruhrgas' virtual gas storage.

In addition to these principal commitments, Ruhrgas will improve the overall situation with regard to transparency, handling of requests for network access and bottleneck management. In that respect, Ruhrgas will publish on its web site a list of all entry and exit points, as well as the capacities and quality of gas available. In addition Ruhrgas will maintain its free of charge balancing services for its transport customers until 1st November 2008, thus beyond the duration of the « Verbändevereinbarung Erdgas II ». Finally, Ruhrgas promised to introduce a so called "use-it-or-lose-it" principle into all its transport contracts, including the contracts with its trading branch. This clause obliges the capacity holder to make the booked capacity available to the market if the capacity remains unused.

For more information, interested parties could consult Ruhrgas' web pages in the near future.

Background

The facts of case go back to the 1990s, when the Norwegian subsidiary of the American oil and gas producer Marathon had requested access several times to the gas pipelines of five gas companies in continental Europe. The Commission services have already settled the case with the German company BEB (see IP/03/1129 of 29 July 2003), the Dutch company Gasunie (see IP/03/547 of 16 April 2003) and the German company Thyssengas (see IP/01/1641 of 23 November 2001).