International Energy Agency Demand Side Management

4,03

MB

Implementing Agreement Task 9: Municipalities and Energy

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Efficiency in a Liberalised System - Case studies of Good

Practice in Rising to the Challenge of Liberalisation

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INTERNATIONAL ENERGY AGENCY

2004

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Introduction

The DSM Implementing Agreement of the International Energy Agency promotes cooperation

between countries in undertaking studies and research on issues related to energy efficiency and

demand side management. A series of Tasks have been carried out and are continuing to be carried

out by the participating countries. Task 9 relates to the role of municipalities in promoting energy

efficiency in the context of liberalisation. The Task partners are the participating countries, in this

case France (as Operating Agent – i.e. coordinator), Austria, Spain, Sweden and The Netherlands

which are represented by experts on the Task committee. The experts in the current project have

come from Energie-Cites (France), Graz Energy Agency (Austria), EcoServeis (Spain), Svekom

(Sweden) and Ambit b.v. (The Netherlands). Funding has come from Ademe (France), the Austrian

Government, ICAEN (Spain), STEM (Sweden) and Novem (The Netherlands), this last organisation

also sending an expert to the Task committee and actively participating in it.

Local authorities have a key role in promoting energy efficiency. This applies in particular to their

own stock of buildings and equipment which provides approximately 2-4% of energy demand,

depending on the country. Certain activities have a significant demand and at the same time

provide major opportunities for improved efficiency.

Energy efficiency activity has been identified as one of the main potential casualties of market

liberalisation and this is felt to be a key problem by local authorities and others. There is a tendency

for energy producers, traders and distributors to concentrate into large conglomerates which

compete with traditional local authority utilities. While profitable energy efficiency activity is

integrated into the services offered, there is a retreat from promoting energy efficiency to the

small consumer which is less profitable in the short term. This makes the public service roles,

including energy efficiency activity, more difficult to maintain.

The Task’s main role is to investigate energy efficiency activity by local authorities in markets

affected by liberalisation to:

- Discover how those impacts of liberalisation discouraging energy efficiency activity can be

circumvented,

- Recommend how the action of local authorities in this field can be made more effective and

- Disseminate this information to local authorities and those arms of government responsible for

supervising municipal activity in this field.

The project has already prepared two reports looking at the roles of local authorities in the energy

sphere and the impact of the liberalisation of energy markets on them. This third report is a survey

of the key examples of best practice identified by the partners, both in their own countries and in

others. In this latter context study visits were made to the UK and California to investigate the

impact in countries highly committed (at least at the beginning) to an intense process of

liberalisation. A number of examples are drawn from this experience.

The examples presented here are also the basis for a series of guidelines for local authorities to

respond to the process of liberalisation. These will appear as report 4 shortly following the current

report.

The case studies presented here are presented by country. They can also be found on the MEELS

website (www.energie-cites.org/meels ) where the case studies can be more closely linked to the

key strategies available to local authorities for responding to liberalisation.