Recommendations for the forthcoming Commission guidance on penalties under the EU Methane Regulation
A focus on methane emissions from fossil gas operations
CAN Europe has developed recommendations for the European Commission’s upcoming guidance to Member States on the application of penalties under the EU Methane Regulation (EUMR).
This guidance must remain fully aligned with the EUMR legal framework and avoid creating loopholes, excessive flexibilities or de facto exemptions that would weaken enforcement and undermine the objectives of the Regulation.
The recommendations below build on previous work by CAN Europe and the Ecologic Institute on EUMR implementation and penalty regimes across Member States. They aim to support legally robust, harmonised and effective implementation of Article 33 EUMR across the European Union.
In that perspective, we recommend the European Commission’s guidance document to include the following five guiding principles:
- The guidance should recognize the central role of penalties and incentivise harmonised
implementation across Member States; - It should define and limit the use of the “security of energy supply” exemption by including clear time limitation of the sanction suspension and applying it only to importer-related obligations;
- It should define minimum levels of sanctions across Member States to avoid “enforcement shopping” by gas operators;
- The guidance should also provide common methodologies for calculating economic benefit and environmental damage; and
- It should avoid any indirect deregulation of the EUMR through technical recommendations.