FSR

In this episode, Piia Karjalainen, Secretary General of the Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) Alliance joins us for a discussion on the role of MaaS in supporting the advancement of the European Green Deal agenda. We discuss issues critical to enabling the development of MaaS, including data sharing, multimodal ticketing and payment systems, as well as the role of the insurance sector in adapting to th...

In this podcast, Leigh Hancher discusses the recent non-binding opinion (http://curia.europa.eu/juris/documents.jsf?num=C-594/18%20) of Gerard Hogan, Advocate General of the European Court of Justice, with regard to a decision on state aid to the nuclear power plant Hinkley Point C in the UK. In Hogan’s opinion, EU judges should dismiss an appeal by Austria aimed at overturning the approval of UK...

In this episode, Auke Lont, CEO of Statnett, talks to Joana Freitas, Ambassador for the Lights on Women initiative of the Florence School of Regulation, about the key challenges around carbon pricing. The European Union currently has a mixed system to price emissions – 41% of greenhouse gas emissions fall under the Emissions Trading System (ETS), 7% are covered by carbon taxes and 4% fall under bo...

In this episode, Net Zero host Joana Freitas invites Andris Piebalgs, Professor at Florence School of Regulation and former EU Commissioner for Energy, to discuss how renewable energy is changing global geopolitics. While over the last 200 years, control of oil, natural gas and coal, as well as of bottlenecks in global sea routes (like the Strait of Hormuz) have shaped the world geopolitics, renew...

In this episode, Elena Bou, Board Member and Innovation Director at Innoenergy, joins host Joana Freitas to discuss how startups are challenging the traditional world of utilities. The energy sector is going through a period of unprecedented opportunities for innovation and growth in lots of different areas, opening doors for start-ups and entrepreneurs. Elena Bou points out that, over the last ye...

In this podcast, Professor Leigh Hancher discusses the Baltic Cable case, a case centred on a power line which interconnects the electric power grids of Germany and Sweden, and weighs the implications of this case for cross-border interconnectors in the EU as well as its wider significance for EU energy law.

In this podcast, Clemens Ziegler (Ziegler State Aid AntiTrust SRL) discusses the EU Commission’s emergency state aid rules, which were announced on 19 March 2020 in response to the COVID-19 crisis. What do these temporary rules allow? And what may be the implications of relaxing some of the EU state aid controls, especially for the energy sector?

In this episode, António Mexia, CEO of EDP Group, joins us to discuss the challenges that utilities are facing in adapting their organization, skills and culture to the energy transition environment. António Mexia starts by noting that we are living in the middle of a revolution: digitalisation is totally transforming most sectors, including the energy sector, which was for decades a very traditio...

What role will Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) technologies play in the energy transition context? In this episode, Mechthild Wörsdörfer, Director for Sustainability, Technology and Outlooks at International Energy Agency (IEA), shares her views on the opportunities and challenges arising from CCUS technologies with Net Zero host Joana Freitas. According to IEA, industry currently a...

In this episode, EU Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson discusses the energy taxation policy in EU and the challenges behind a just transition with Joana Freitas, Ambassador for the FSR Lights on Women initiative. To achieve the level of ambition that is proposed in the Green Deal, the EU needs to set an effective carbon pricing policy. However, as Commissioner Simson notes, in some European countrie...

In this episode, Kadri Simson, the Energy European Commissioner, discusses the EU's energy policy vision for the EU Green Deal with Joana Freitas, Ambassador for the FSR Lights on Women initiative. As 75% of EU’s greenhouse gas emissions come from using or producing energy, energy policy will play a major role in delivering the climate targets. Member States have been working on their National Ene...

Community energy is one of the current buzzwords in the public discourse over the electricity sector and the energy transition. Within a community, citizens can adopt new models for the production and consumption of energy. Among them, there are peer-to-peer (P2P) energy trading and collective self-consumption. In this podcast, Nicolò Rossetto (FSR) and Josh Roberts (REScoop) discuss the concept o...

End users have traditionally played a limited and rather passive role in the provision of electricity. However, the decentralisation and digitalisation of the energy sector today are changing the way electricity is produced, exchanged and consumed. New energy models, for instance peer-to-peer (P2P) trading, community self-consumption, and transactive energy, are emerging. In this podcast, Nicolò R...

An explosion in medium and small electricity prosumers has been observed in the past decade across the EU, mainly driven by generous support measures and PV cost reduction. This era is now coming to an end with the phase-out of net metering schemes and feed-in tariffs. Therefore, new business models ensuring economic sustainability are essential. In this podcast, Nicolò Rossetto (FSR) and Donal Br...

In this podcast, Professor Kim Talus from Tulane University discusses the latest controversies surrounding the OPAL gas pipeline, which links the Nordstream gas pipeline to Eastern Europe, and the implications of the recent judgment from the European Court of Justice for the interpretation and application of EU energy law. On 10 Sept 2019, the General Court of the ECJ annulled an earlier Commissio...

In this podcast, Dr Leonie Reins from Tilburg University discusses the role of the energy solidarity principle (as outlined in Article 194 TFEU) and the foreign direct investment (FDI) screening regulation in the development of a more integrated EU regulatory framework and a fully-fledged Energy Union. In particular, she examines how the General Court’s recent interpretation of the energy solidari...

In this podcast, Elina Hautakangas and Tatu Pahkala, from the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment in Finland, discuss the changing role of distribution system operators (DSOs) in the EU Clean Energy Package and reflect upon the implications of this shift for the EU internal electricity market and, specifically, Finland’s energy sector.

In this podcast, Dr Seita Romppanen, from the University of Eastern Finland, discusses the key aspects of two interrelated regulatory instruments of the EU climate and energy policy framework for 2030 under the Clean Energy Package: the Effort Sharing Regulation and the so-called LULUCF Regulation on land use, land-use change and forestry. Dr Romppanean introduces the overarching regulatory framew...

According to the IEA, an average of 1.7% of total gas production is leaked into the atmosphere before it reaches the consumers. The phenomenon constitutes both a serious climate threat and an economic loss. In 2016, US EPA adopted new rules aimed at reducing methane emissions in the oil and gas sector. The rules include standards for periodic monitoring of possible leakage. In this podcast, Maria...

Brussels, Professor Jonathan Stern, distinguished Research Fellow (Natural Gas Research Programme), from Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, was a moderator of a session “Energy transition: how can LNG contribute?”. In this podcast, Professor Stern discusses LNG as an important asset to reach 2050 decarbonisation targets, as well as potential problems regarding emissions. He points out that in th...

The evolution of the structure of electricity systems and the new possibilities offered by digital technologies are leading to an evolution of electricity market designs around the world. In Italy, the need for new providers of flexibility and the increasing amount of distributed energy resources (DER) have prompted a reform of the market for ancillary services and its opening to virtually aggrega...

In this podcast, Dr Ruven Fleming from the University of Groningen discusses electricity storage in EU law specifically from the point of view of the Clean Energy Package. He provides a brief introduction to what electricity storage is and why it is needed. He then focuses on how the new provisions of the Clean Energy Package address electricity storage and he discusses the practical implications...

At the 2nd edition of the FSR Innovation Bootcamp, Bjarne Steffen, senior researcher at ETH Zürich and visiting researcher at MIT, gave a presentation around his work on renewable energy financing. In this podcast, Bjarne discusses his work around the cost of capital of investments in renewables with Tim Schittekatte, researcher at the FSR. Bjarne and his co-authors found that between 2005 and 201...

Prof. Poul Erik Morthorst of the Danish Technical University (DTU)’s ideas are clear: carbon pricing cannot be the excuse to delay or avoid investments in technology supporting renewable energy development. On the contrary, taking immediate action could lead to short-term benefits: “We should invest in RES now, and have an immediate effect on CO2 reduction” urges Professor Morthorst. [Listen to th...

Climate change is likely to modify significantly patterns of capital investments and constitutes both a risk and an opportunity for investors and financial institutions. A framework aligning the decisions of financial institutions with long-term climate goals is taking shape, and carbon intensive investments will likely face an increasing risk of being stranded. Within this framework, banks must b...