Geothermal electricity

At the beginning of summer 2021, gas prices started increasing tremendously globally due to a wide array of factors, from an exceptionally cold winter in Europe in 2020, to macroeconomic fallouts of the COVID 19 pandemic, without mentioning geopolitics, to technical issues in infrastructure bottlenecks of the fossil fuel production infrastructure.

Following the proposal in the PPE (multiannual programming for energy) by the French Government to stop financial support to geothermal electricity, EGEC and the French industry call for a stable and forward looking framework.

Member States and the European Parliament are negociating the rules that will govern the electricity system after 2020. At stake: setting a framework that allows a functioning market to be increasingly based on renewable generation.

The Electricity Market Regulation considers renewable power production only as a source of instability, due to the variable or intermittent production of PV and wind technologies. It introduces Capacity Remuneration Mechanisms for dispatchable or flexible generation able to provide grid services to stabilize an electricity market with high renewable penetration. Yet, the debate ignores the potential of flexible renewable production, i.e. geothermal, to provide such grid services.

The "Market Design" legislative proposals are the last components of the Clean Energy Package to enter the negociation phase between the EU co-legislators.