Brussels, 16/10/2008 (Agence Europe) - Before next spring's evaluation of the results of the triennial Energy for Europe 2007-09 action plan adopted in March 2007, which laid the foundation stones for a common energy policy, the European Council spent a large part of its meeting on 15-16 October on the question of energy security.

To bolster its conclusions on the matter, the European Council also adopted a report (elaborated by the French presidency) at the special summit of 1 September on the Russian-Georgian conflict. The particular emphasis put on energy security by the Heads of state and governments of the Union (a highly sensitive issue for Baltic countries and Poland, which have a lot of uncertainties about their electricity isolation and increasing dependency on Russian hydrocarbons), was welcomed by the Lithuanian president Valdas Adamkus.

On the eve of Tuesday's summit, the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso and the heads of governments of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Sweden agreed on establishing a Baltic Interconnection Plan, the details of which will be negotiated next year. It will be up and running in 2010. As the Lithuanian prime minister, Gediminas Kirkilas, stressed on Tuesday, this initiative, the goal of which is coordinated action at a Community level on energy infrastructure projects, involving all countries in the Baltic, makes the Union “responsible” for developing electric interconnections, diversification of gas supplies and enhancing electricity production capacity in the region. The Union's responsibility, also includes the need for “solidarity” between member states and is largely confirmed in the EU27 conclusions, which while affirming the priority nature of energy security for the Union, its member states and their citizens also recognise the specific situation of countries in the Baltic.

In its conclusions, the European Council insists that, “the security of energy supply is a Union priority”. It explains that this will be obtained by way of solidarity between all the member states. it also decided to intensify the ongoing work by deciding on the following orientations and by inviting the Commission to submit corresponding proposals or initiatives: finalising the work on the 3rd legislative package for the liberalisation of the internal electricity and gas market after the political agreement at the Energy Council on 10 October; acceleration of Community Action Plan implementation on energy efficiency adopted at the end of 2006 and which aims to reduce energy in the Union by 20% by 2020; speed up implementation of the Strategic Plan for the development of energy technologies (SET-Plan) adopted at the end of 2007 and which aims to increase the use of clean energy technologies, such as carbon capture and storage; to continue energy source diversification, to which measures in the energy/climate package will contribute and whose negotiations are due to finding before the end of the year; to promote better market use of hydrocarbons through greater transparency on flows and stocks and through the exchange of information about needs and resources in the long term; to develop a crisis mechanism to tackle temporary energy supply cuts in supply; the strengthen and accompany critical infrastructure, such as the Trans-European Energy Transport (TEN-E) and the liquid gas terminals.

The European Council explains that specific attention will be given to interconnections and the connection of the most isolation European countries based on European networks with supply infrastructure and supply, as well as the need to diversity sources and supply routes. The European Council also said that a work calendar would be drawn up with producer and/or transit countries to ensure the stability of supply and the diversification of sources and supply routes. The European Council explains that a meeting with Caspian Sea and transit countries will be organised for spring 2009.

In the double perspective of solidarity and responsibility, as affirmed in the conclusions, the European Council will propose, via the report drawn up by the Council and added to the annex, actions to take in the short term by the Commission, the Council and member states in the six energy security pillars: energy efficiency, energy source diversity, energy supply and demand visibility, solidarity mechanisms, infrastructure and external relations. This report precedes the very much awaited 2nd strategic energy analysis the Commission is due to publish on 4 November.

At the end of the summit, the Lithuanian Head of State, Valdas Adamkus, welcomed the fact that, “European countries have understood the Lithuanian problem concerning energy security and the closing down of the Ignalina nuclear plant”. He concluded that, “we will examine the means of financial support (Community: Ed) before the spring 2009 summit, to guarantee our energy security and prevent Lithuania becoming totally dependent on Russia after Ignalina closes down”.