Mott's Blog

While the Commission communicated to the Polish Government in 2013  that it considered the Polish Green Certificates to be state aid, requiring notification of the Commission and approval under the 2008 guidelines, the Polish Government has repeatedly denied this fact. Now in the new law on RES, Article 39.2 requires that certificates and other forms of support be added together to determine if the state aid limits on support for an individual project would be exceeded. This reflects the fact that the Polish Government has known for years that the Green Certificates are state aid. The Commission has decided that green certificates are state aid in every case before it (earlier based on the substitution fees in various Member State laws and later on the certificate as a valuable asset itself). See  DOUBLING DOWN ON A JUNK POKER HAND: THE POLISH GOVERNMENT APPARENTLY INTENDS TO IGNORE ITS TREATY OBLIGATIONS ON STATE AID , Mott's Blog, June 7, 2014 (detailed references and...

August in Poland. The politicians are doing what they do best... taking a break. During this period of inattention, it might be useful to compare what the Polish legislature  is doing on renewable energy compared to the French legislature in the same situation (albeit less severe in France). The French did not notify Brussels of their wind tariff in their renewable energy law.When the preliminary memo came out that the European Court was getting ready to find the wind tariff to be state aid, everyone was quite attentive to the possible consequences. Unnotified and unapproved state aid is illegal in the European Union .  Legal commentators noted that once the case got back to the national, French court, it " essentially has no choice but to cancel the preferential feed-in tariffs to wind power producers agreed to in 2008, likely resulting in massive refunds for consumers. France can expect down-stream lawsuits from wind power producers as a result of government FIT adjus...