The European Commission said on November 27 that the EC has opened an
in-depth investigation to assess whether Spain’s “environmental
incentive” for coal power plants is in line with EU State aid rules. At
this stage, the Commission has concerns that the support has been used
to implement mandatory environmental EU standards as regards sulphur
oxide emissions, which applied to coal power plants at the time, the EC
said in a press release. If confirmed, this means that the scheme did
not actually have any environmental incentive effect. Furthermore, the
financial support may breach an established principle of EU State aid
rules, namely that Member States may not grant State aid to companies to
meet mandatory environmental EU standards.
“If you pollute, you pay – this is a long-standing principle in EU environmental law,” EU Competition Policy Commissioner
Margrethe Vestager
said. “EU State aid rules do not allow Member States to relieve
companies of this responsibility using taxpayer money. We currently
believe that this Spanish scheme did not incentivise coal power plants
to reduce harmful sulphur oxide emissions – they were already under an
obligation to do so under EU environmental law. Therefore, we are
concerned that the support gave these coal power plants an unfair
competitive advantage. We will now investigate this issue further,” she
added.
The opening of an in-depth investigation gives Spain and interested
third parties an opportunity to submit comments. It does not prejudge
the outcome of the investigation, the Commission said.
https://www.neweurope.eu/article/eu-commission-probes-spains-support-coal-power-plants/