João de Macedo Vitorino, Lawyer and Partner at MACEDO VITORINO, shares his viewpoint in the digital magazine ADVOCATUS from ECO on May 10th, regarding "Freedom and Slander," to the recent entry into force of Directive (EU) 2024/1069.
"As much as accusations are beneficial to the Republic, so too are calumnies pernicious. Continuing on this path will increase the Republic's exposure to slander and the risks of losing our freedom."
The recent entry into force of Directive (EU) 2024/1069 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 April 2024 on "strategic legal actions against public participation", reminded me of the wise words of Niccolò Machiavelli on the safeguarding of liberty in the Republic. He said that "to those who are proposed in a city for the guard of their liberty, no more useful and necessary authority can be given than that of being able to indict the citizens before the people, any magistrate or council, whenever they sin anything against the free state." At the same time, he warned that "slander is used more where accusation is used less and where cities are less ordered to receive it." Machiavelli understood that to repress slander, one cannot repress the possibility of accusing, but the opposite: the power to accuse is fundamental to freedom and must not be restricted. Rather, the powers of the magistrates should be ordered so that they could distinguish accusation from calumny and punish the latter.
The Directive says it aims to "remove obstacles to the proper conduct of civil actions while ensuring protection for natural and legal persons involved in public participation in matters of public interest". Among those targeted by the need for protection are entities with "public participation", namely, journalists and academics, but also political office holders. Among the instigators against whom they deserve special protection are the somewhat mysterious "powerful entities, such as individuals, lobbying groups, large commercial corporations, politicians, and organs of the state."
The Directive states that "it is important to protect natural and legal persons from abusive court proceedings against public participation". It emphasizes that these proceedings "are not initiated for the purpose of access to justice, but to silence public debate and prevent the investigation and reporting of breaches of Union and national law, usually resorting to harassment and intimidation."
And so, it obliges member states to create special safeguards to make it more difficult to bring proceedings against entities with public participation, namely, that the courts may require the provision of security and the so-called "corrective measures against abusive judicial proceedings against public participation", such as increased court costs and fines.
Confronting Machiavelli with the purposes of this Directive (EU) 2024/1069, the clash between Machiavelli's warning and what the Directive imposes on the Member States of the European Union becomes clear. It is therefore necessary to ask, politically, whether we are not encouraging slander by making it more difficult to prosecute entities with public participation; whether the European institutions are not reacting hotly in the face of recent circumstances; and whether it is legitimate for politicians to include themselves as beneficiaries of these measures.
From a legal point of view, we must ask whether there are not already sufficient means, at least in our legal system, to react against so-called abusive actions. In Portuguese civil procedure, in addition to the possibility of preliminary dismissal, naturally limited by the adversarial principle, there is the institution of bad faith litigation, which allows the court to impose fines of its motion on those who make improper use of the right of action. In criminal proceedings, it is up to the Public Prosecutor's Office, even in crimes that depend on private prosecution, to accuse or not to accuse; Which, things being done well, can only happen when there is enough evidence to bring the defendant to trial.
It is also left to the constitutionalists to ask whether, by making it difficult for some and not others, to access the courts for reasons that are difficult to objectify, we are not calling into question Article 20 of the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic, which establishes for everyone the right to access the law and to effective judicial protection, which means that everyone is granted the right to access the courts.
Above all, since freedom and equality are at stake, it is up to all of us to reflect on whether we want to pursue this path of restricting access to the courts to present our claims. And if, since the means already exist, we should not rather be more demanding of our judicial magistrates in sanctioning abusive actions, in "punishing slander" as Machiavelli would say, instead of creating restrictions on access to the courts for a few and only for the benefit of a few. For my part, I can only intuit that continuing this path will increase the Republic's exposure to slander and the risks of losing our freedom.
O Secretário de Estado da Energia português anunciou recentemente um aumento da tarifa paga aos produtores pela eletricidade (FiT) resultante dos leilões de 2019 e 2020. Este aumento corresponderá à taxa de inflação de 2022 e 2023. A lógica desta medida consiste em salvar até 700MW de projetos de PV adjudicados nos leilões que, devido ao seu FiT muito baixo, não são financiáveis e, por conseguinte, correm o risco de não serem concluídos. O governo português argumenta que as atuais circunstâncias inflacionistas excecionais justificam esta medida, mas apenas para os projetos com tarifas muito baixas (começando no histórico mínimo de 11,14Eur /MWh!). Esta situação mostra que, em certa medida, o modelo de leilão 2019-2022 teve as suas falhas, uma vez que privilegiou a fixação de preços arrojados, aceitando o risco de ter projetos não financiáveis. Entendemos que o aumento dos benefícios para as energias renováveis não é politicamente fácil de vender quando as energias renováveis estão no centro das atenções e a receber "benefícios de excecionais" do mercado da eletricidade. Mas, ao resgatar alguns desses projetos que não cumprem as suas obrigações de leilão devido aos preços anormalmente baixos oferecidos pelos seus promotores, o governo português está a absorver o risco de inflação para alguns, mas não para todos os projetos fotovoltaicos adjudicados nesses leilões.
Por isso, a primeira questão que se põe é a seguinte: "Onde é que vamos traçar a linha para este resgate?". Parece que a linha será traçada abaixo de um determinado preço para permitir poupar 700MWh em projetos. Qual é o preço e quais são os critérios para defini-lo? Sabemos que a viabilidade não depende apenas do preço, mas também, entre outros, dos custos de desenvolvimento que são diferentes de um projeto para o outro. Se a ideia é resgatar todos os projetos, independentemente de outros aspetos (incluindo a própria “bancabilidade” do promotor), estamos a distorcer o mercado e, mais do que isso, estamos a distorcer as condições do leilão, bem como as regras de contratação pública. Nestes casos, os termos e condições de um leilão só podem ser alterados se essas alterações não afetarem a concorrência entre todos os proponentes.
Pela mesmo motivo, podemos questionar por que razão excluímos qualquer ajustamento àqueles que optaram por pagar uma indemnização ao sistema elétrico e pagaram um montante elevado para corresponder às ofertas equivalentes da FiT. Em regra, especialmente depois de terem sido adjudicados os projetos, não deve ser permitido à entidade adjudicante favorecer os proponentes que fizeram ofertas mais baixas contra aqueles que prudentemente ofereceram preços mais elevados ou escolheram o mecanismo de compensação (que supostamente tem um peso financeiro idêntico ao correspondente das ofertas de preços fixos). Outros licitadores, se pudessem ter antecipado esta correção da inflação, poderiam ter feito ofertas FiT mais baixas.
Parece, portanto, claro que, a menos que as bases para esta medida sejam explicadas muito claramente, aqueles que ficarão de fora podem sentir-se tentados a contestar a legalidade do aumento da tarifa que o governo português está a oferecer uns excluindo outros.
Mas, pondo de lado as questões jurídicas, perguntamo-nos até que ponto esta medida será bem-sucedida. Será que um ajustamento à inflação de 2022 e 2023 (algo como 9% e 5% respetivamente) será suficiente para salvar projetos com o compromisso de vender cada MWh a 11 euros ou outro valor similar? Para alguns, provavelmente não. E para a maioria provavelmente não será um impulso tão significativo. Perguntamo-nos porque é que o governo português apenas considerou a atualização inflacionista da FIT e não teve em conta outras medidas como a redução dos 15 anos de compromisso com sistema para 12 ou mesmo para 10 anos. Isto seria mais eficaz a facilitar o financiamento dos projetos, sem custos imediatos para os consumidores. Naturalmente, esta redução da duração do compromisso deveria aplicar-se a todos do mesmo modo, incluindo os proponentes que optaram por pagar uma compensação ao sistema.
This article was published by Expresso, a Portuguese newspaper, on April 1.
There is no doubt that the world is at a turning point, in History, in the Economy, and in the lives of us all. In History, the veil is now falling away that for so long prevented us from recognizing one of the greatest tyrannies on Earth (and don't think that Russia is the only one that we have yet to admit as such, as we still have China and countries like Saudi Arabia, which we continue to treat as equals in values when they are not). In the Economy, we have entered an inflationary cycle, which was already inevitable as a consequence of the monetary policies followed in the fight against the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. And which, with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, nobody can tell where it will lead us. In the lives of us Westerners, fortunate enough to live far from war and poverty, we feel squeezed by the rising prices of everything we consume and perplexed in our lack of understanding of the price-setting mechanisms. Some call for the taxation of capital gains that they adjectivize as unjustified, immoral, and the cause of the famine that affects the majority. Others, more moderate, question the universality of market rules and wonder whether it is not time for a new chapter in Economics too.
In this dire context, the European Commission recently proposed a plan called REPowerEU to erase dependence on Russian fossil fuels before 2030, to rebuild European gas reserves and to address rising energy prices in Europe. This initiative might, besides shaking the gas market, have a significant impact on the renewables sector, as it aims at allowing member States to take price regulation measures, to impose temporary windfall taxes, and to use of revenues from emission trading and state aid mechanisms. In the Iberian electricity market we have also seen discussions about electricity pricing mechanisms. The electricity wholesale prices in OMIE (where the daily price and the intra-daily price of electricity in the Iberian Peninsula are negotiated) are calculated through on a marginal prices mechanism that tries to mirror the meeting of forces between the supply and demand for electricity. There is an algorithm for these calculations called EUPHEMIA (who knows if named after the Greek saint tortured to death for not agreeing to participate in pagan sacrifices in the Roman Constantinople of the 3rd century) and we can say in this regard things are very complex; but, trying to simplify them, the setting of electricity wholesale price at OMIE works as follows:
OMIE puts the demand indicated by the operators of the Spanish (REE) and Portuguese (REN) grids together with the offers made by all different types of Iberian producers. The price established for the purchase of the electricity will be the price of the last offer to be entered into the system (normally, that of those who has less incentive to sell, i.e., those who obtain a lower profit margin). If this last offer comes from a combined cycle gas power plant producer it will reflect the costs of this producer and not, for example, the average of the production costs of all the offers made that day. A photovoltaic plant producer will sell its electricity in OMIE at the selling offer price of the producer of the combined cycle gas plant. This, in the current context, means having a significantly higher margin than it would be willing to accept if all the offers to the market were from photovoltaic production.
Here one may ask whether if, by aggregating different types of offers and choosing a price-setting criterion that seems incapable of reflecting the different production costs, we are not preventing the market from functioning properly as it would if the direct confrontation between comparable offers and demand was possible. Of course, the choice of the marginal prices’ principle has a technical explanation, a rationale that may seem more appropriate in a context of abundant supply and homogeneous costs (where the pressure to sell is similar for all producers) but it is apparently necessary because the system needs the energy produced by gas and other fossil fuels burning producers.
The creation of a special tax on renewable generation sources to match the so-called windfall profits (in the style of the infamous claw-back tax created by the Portuguese Government to eliminate the “unjustified” profits of Portuguese producers in MIBEL compared to the Spanish, victims of a special tax of 7%) implies a disincentive to what we are all saying we want to encourage. A disincentive with not only immediate impact, but also for the future of investment in renewable energy marketplace, which needs fiscal predictability. It is important to remember that the market operates based on a perception of risk, which includes factors within the market itself, such as technological developments or, conversely, negative developments in the cost of production factors. If we add non-market risks, such as administrative pricing or the imposition of taxes, the market will be disrupted, affecting, without discrimination, the supply (with high costs producers having to close doors) and the demand (which may have to endure either higher prices or shortages of electricity).
Therefore, ideas like the setting of a price ceiling at 180 euros per MWh, as has been suggested to the EU Commission by the Spanish and Portuguese Governments, will result production at a deficit in gas-fired plants. Certainly, producers with higher costs will withdraw their supply from the market generating supply shortages, unless they are subsidized (making the measure useless). We would risk not having electricity for everyone, because, at the present moment, the energy supply is not elastic (much has been said in this regard about the Portuguese Government's haste in anticipating the closure of the coal-fired plants).
Because all the above results of prices following natural laws and having no ideology, any electricity prices’ regulation is to be avoided. And taxation on the so-called windfall profits will naturally cause prices to rise or electricity to be in short supply for everyone. The least harmful way of State interference will be the direct support to those consumers who are least able to bear the increases in electricity market prices: the individuals and small companies with the fewest resources and the electro-intensive consumer companies whose activity is indispensable to the country's economic fabric. And the most efficient way of providing such support will always be paying individuals and companies in cash (and never by granting them new credit lines, the equivalent to offering water to a drowning person); or, better yet in the case of companies, offering them direct tax rebates.
Consequently, the EU Commission and the EU member States should, first of all, give priority to a consensual reassessment of the electricity pricing models and, if possible, adjust them so that they allow the market to function better, because it is not the market that is failing, but possibly the rules to which trading platforms like OMIE are subject to.
This article was published by Expresso, a Portuguese newspaper, on April 1.
There is no doubt that the world is at a turning point, in History, in the Economy, and in the lives of us all. In History, the veil is now falling away that for so long prevented us from recognizing one of the greatest tyrannies on Earth (and don't think that Russia is the only one that we have yet to admit as such, as we still have China and countries like Saudi Arabia, which we continue to treat as equals in values when they are not). In the Economy, we have entered an inflationary cycle, which was already inevitable as a consequence of the monetary policies followed in the fight against the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. And which, with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, nobody can tell where it will lead us. In the lives of us Westerners, fortunate enough to live far from war and poverty, we feel squeezed by the rising prices of everything we consume and perplexed in our lack of understanding of the price-setting mechanisms. Some call for the taxation of capital gains that they adjectivize as unjustified, immoral, and the cause of the famine that affects the majority. Others, more moderate, question the universality of market rules and wonder whether it is not time for a new chapter in Economics too.
In this dire context, the European Commission recently proposed a plan called REPowerEU to erase dependence on Russian fossil fuels before 2030, to rebuild European gas reserves and to address rising energy prices in Europe. This initiative might, besides shaking the gas market, have a significant impact on the renewables sector, as it aims at allowing member States to take price regulation measures, to impose temporary windfall taxes, and to use of revenues from emission trading and state aid mechanisms. In the Iberian electricity market we have also seen discussions about electricity pricing mechanisms. The electricity wholesale prices in OMIE (where the daily price and the intra-daily price of electricity in the Iberian Peninsula are negotiated) are calculated through on a marginal prices mechanism that tries to mirror the meeting of forces between the supply and demand for electricity. There is an algorithm for these calculations called EUPHEMIA (who knows if named after the Greek saint tortured to death for not agreeing to participate in pagan sacrifices in the Roman Constantinople of the 3rd century) and we can say in this regard things are very complex; but, trying to simplify them, the setting of electricity wholesale price at OMIE works as follows:
OMIE puts the demand indicated by the operators of the Spanish (REE) and Portuguese (REN) grids together with the offers made by all different types of Iberian producers. The price established for the purchase of the electricity will be the price of the last offer to be entered into the system (normally, that of those who has less incentive to sell, i.e., those who obtain a lower profit margin). If this last offer comes from a combined cycle gas power plant producer it will reflect the costs of this producer and not, for example, the average of the production costs of all the offers made that day. A photovoltaic plant producer will sell its electricity in OMIE at the selling offer price of the producer of the combined cycle gas plant. This, in the current context, means having a significantly higher margin than it would be willing to accept if all the offers to the market were from photovoltaic production.
Here one may ask whether if, by aggregating different types of offers and choosing a price-setting criterion that seems incapable of reflecting the different production costs, we are not preventing the market from functioning properly as it would if the direct confrontation between comparable offers and demand was possible. Of course, the choice of the marginal prices’ principle has a technical explanation, a rationale that may seem more appropriate in a context of abundant supply and homogeneous costs (where the pressure to sell is similar for all producers) but it is apparently necessary because the system needs the energy produced by gas and other fossil fuels burning producers.
The creation of a special tax on renewable generation sources to match the so-called windfall profits (in the style of the infamous claw-back tax created by the Portuguese Government to eliminate the “unjustified” profits of Portuguese producers in MIBEL compared to the Spanish, victims of a special tax of 7%) implies a disincentive to what we are all saying we want to encourage. A disincentive with not only immediate impact, but also for the future of investment in renewable energy marketplace, which needs fiscal predictability. It is important to remember that the market operates based on a perception of risk, which includes factors within the market itself, such as technological developments or, conversely, negative developments in the cost of production factors. If we add non-market risks, such as administrative pricing or the imposition of taxes, the market will be disrupted, affecting, without discrimination, the supply (with high costs producers having to close doors) and the demand (which may have to endure either higher prices or shortages of electricity).
Therefore, ideas like the setting of a price ceiling at 180 euros per MWh, as has been suggested to the EU Commission by the Spanish and Portuguese Governments, will result production at a deficit in gas-fired plants. Certainly, producers with higher costs will withdraw their supply from the market generating supply shortages, unless they are subsidized (making the measure useless). We would risk not having electricity for everyone, because, at the present moment, the energy supply is not elastic (much has been said in this regard about the Portuguese Government's haste in anticipating the closure of the coal-fired plants).
Because all the above results of prices following natural laws and having no ideology, any electricity prices’ regulation is to be avoided. And taxation on the so-called windfall profits will naturally cause prices to rise or electricity to be in short supply for everyone. The least harmful way of State interference will be the direct support to those consumers who are least able to bear the increases in electricity market prices: the individuals and small companies with the fewest resources and the electro-intensive consumer companies whose activity is indispensable to the country's economic fabric. And the most efficient way of providing such support will always be paying individuals and companies in cash (and never by granting them new credit lines, the equivalent to offering water to a drowning person); or, better yet in the case of companies, offering them direct tax rebates.
Consequently, the EU Commission and the EU member States should, first of all, give priority to a consensual reassessment of the electricity pricing models and, if possible, adjust them so that they allow the market to function better, because it is not the market that is failing, but possibly the rules to which trading platforms like OMIE are subject to.
Overview
Portugal and Spain are strongly committed to the decarbonization goals set by the Paris Agreement. After a significative downtime, mainly due to the 2008-2012 economic crisis, there have been significant changes in recent years with strategy refocusing on the development of solar energy comes along, as both countries have two of the highest solar irradiation levels in Europe.
This is a market with high growth potential where, until the end of 2030, Portugal intends on reaching 9 GW of solar photovoltaic ("PV") installed capacity, and Spain has set the objective of reaching 37 GW, against a current installed capacity of, respectively, 1,030 MW and 11,547 MW.
In this article, we have looked into how both countries are addressing the challenges arising of how to combine limited the low availability of network capacity with a high demand from market players. Both countries have launched public tenders for PV capacity and to these challenges have added a political priority of reducing tariffs to final costumers.
The Iberian auction experiences
The Portuguese National Plan for Energy and Climate 2030 (“PNEC 2030”) established a set of ambitious goals for renewable energy to be met until 2030. According to this plan, renewable energies should represent 47% of national electricity consumption in 2030, with an increase in installed capacity up to 28.8 GW. Particularly in solar, there has been a significant reduction of costs associated with PV technology since 2017 which, alongside with the high level of predictability of solar resources, has led to an increase of the number of requests for energy production licenses in Portugal. Such demand proved to be higher than the installed capacity of the Public Grid (“RESP”).
To deal with a reduced grid capacity, in 2019 the Portuguese Government changed the legal framework of the electricity sector reviewing the whole procedure for allocating power generation licenses. The licensing process was reversed, requiring the promoter to request the granting of a grid capacity title (“RESP Title”) before applying for a power plant production license. Under the 2019 regulatory framework, the RESP Title can be obtained: (i) by request directly to the Portuguese Energy Directorate (“DGEG”) if there is any available network capacity; (ii) by entering into a capacity agreement with the grid operator if there is no available network capacity, where the promoter bears the costs of the grid capacity extension; or (iii) by award in an auction organized by DGEG, where the title is granted after a tendering procedure for the allocation of reserve capacity.
The first Portuguese auction under this new regime, in August 2019, awarded 1150 MW, distributed by 22 projects. Bids were submitted by two different pricing schemes: the guaranteed remuneration tariff where the average result has been of €22,22 p/MWh; and the market scheme, with an average tariff offered of €18.36 p/MWh. This auction was a huge success, with demand outstripping nine times the supply and the lowest ever solar power electricity price bid of €14.8 p/MW. A total of 64 companies participated, including major players in the energy sector, such as EDPR, Galp, Iberdrola, Voltalia, EDF and Finerge. By country, Spain was the big winner country of the auction with the largest lot awarded to JB Capital Markets, with 110 MW. Iberdrola won five lots, corresponding to 149 MW, and Solaria won four lots, with 49 MW.
A subsequent auction of 700 MW held in August 2020 awarded 670 MW composed of 12 lots in Alentejo and Algarve, with an average bid of €0.020/kWh. A total of 35 bidders participated, with demand once again largely outstripping the offer. The big winner was the South Korea's company Hanwha Q-Cells, awarded with 315 MW, while Tag Energy obtained 20 MW. Iberdrola and Endesa gained 69 MW and 99 MW respectively. This second auction was perceived by the Portuguese Government as an even greater success than the one of 2019, with a gain of about 833 thousand Euros for each MW awarded, an increase of about 80% compared with 2019. The Portuguese Government came into this auction expecting to obtain 33.5 thousand euros per MWh, but the winners ended up paying to 37.1 thousand euros per MWh to the system. Also, the World record for the lowest output price was broken once again with a bid of €0.0112/kWh.
In Spain, the development of solar energy started earlier. At the beginning of the new millennium, the country started stimulating the solar energy market with attractive remuneration schemes and subsidies which led to its early development. In 2008, Spain had 2,718 MW of installed solar capacity but the outbreak of the financial crisis, an unexpected increase of PV installations, and the Spanish Government move to contain costs by reducing the sector’s subsidies lead to a severe market contraction. In 2009, requests for injection were in the reduced number of 44 MW.
The turning point came with the Paris Agreement and with Spain’s national action plans to meet new decarbonizations goals. Economic conditions allowed the decline of the PV technology implementation costs, boosting investment in this segment of the energy market, and, as in Portugal, resulting in an increase of requests for energy production licenses exceeding the available grid reception capacity.
Spain launched its first 700 MW renewable energy auction in January 2016 exclusively for wind and biomass technology. In May 2017, a new bigger auction was held: 3,000 MW were awarded. In both Forestalia took the biggest share, with in excess of 1,500 MW of wind and biomass capacity in Aragón.
In the second auction of 2017 (which also comprised solar), 5,037 MW were granted to 40 different companies. The largest share was granted to the Spanish industrial group ACS with 1.55 GW of assigned projects, followed by X-Elio (455 MW), Endesa (338 MW), Forestalia (316 MW), Gas Natural Fenosa (250 MW) and Solaria Energía (250 MW).
In 2020, Spain announced ambitious targets for the development of renewable energy under its proposed Integrated National Energy and Climate Plan (“PNIEC”) 2021-2030, which comprises the installation of around 5,000 MW of new renewable energy capacity per year over the next decade. To achieve these goals and increase competitiveness process, a new remuneration scheme for renewable energy facilities was established through the New Economic Regime for Renewable Energy (“REER”) setting up a long-term guaranteed remuneration price for awarded bidders in an auction.
On January 26, 2021, Spain held the first auction of installed power capacity under the REER, where 84 companies offered bids, and represented a total of 9,700 MW of capacity. There were 32 winning bids, representing a total of 3,034MW of energy capacity awarded: 2,036 MW of solar PV and 998 MW of wind energy. The average price for solar was set at 0.02447/kWh and the lowest bid at €0.01498. The most successful bidder has been X-Elio Energy with 315 MW of PV capacity, followed by Iberdrola subsidiary Iberenova Promociones (243 MW) and Spanish utility Naturgy (196 MW).
Different approaches to auctions
In its auction procedures, Portugal had more restrictive approach than Spain, as only new PV installations were allowed to participate, while in Spain new facilities and enlargements or modifications of existing facilities were eligible.
The application process in Portugal is very simple. Promoters sign up their application through an online platform and provided basic information regarding their company and their bidding capacity intentions. In Spain, it there is more bureaucracy. First, promoters have to be pre-qualified, by submitting a high detailed set of documentation regarding their commercial information electronically. After being pre-qualified, bidders are entitled to participate in the auction for a certain power previous declared. In both countries, promoters must provide a bid bond: 10,000€ p/MW in Portugal and 60,000€ p/MW in Spain.
In the Portuguese bidding stage, promoters submit several bids through an online platform, applying for one of the following remuneration schemes already mentioned above: (i) market scheme without storage where promoters bid for a contribution to be paid to the National Electrical System (“NES”); (ii) a fixed guaranteed tariff structure for a 15-year period, where the bids expressed a discount to the reference feed; and (iii) a market scheme for plants incorporating a storage system, where the bids expressed a discount to an annual fee. The storage mechanism was a new feature compared to the auction held in 2019. This modality has two advantages: since renewable energy production is intermittent, it is essential to increase this storage capacity in order to obtain energy autonomously. On the other hand, concerning price fluctuations, storage ensures that the price of electricity injected into the grid never exceeds a particular value.
In Spain, the capacity is awarded through a competitive sealed-bid auction whereby the awarded bid corresponds to an awarded price. As such, Producers are bound to sell all their energy at their bidding price, with small adjustments concerning wholesale market pricing. In the last auction, promoters were granted a 12-year offtake agreement that could vary in future auctions between 10 and 15 years. The specific remuneration under the ERRE is obtained from its auction price, the remuneration parameters of the technology, the characteristics of each facility and its participation in the energy market. For the 2021 auction, the remuneration parameters included: a minimum number of annual operating hours; a maximum number of annual operating hours; and market adjustment percentages. This auction offered the possibility for bidders to include energy storage in their offers. Although, no winning bids featured such technology. This can be justified by the fact that the storage market in Spain is currently underdeveloped, limited to pilot projects or research facilities and by the fact that the profitability of this model depends exclusively on market prices.
The Portuguese bidding phase is much more competitive than the Spanish one since promoters are entitled to make several bids competing directly and simultaneously with other promoters, and thus, it is no surprise that output price has been breaking records. The Spanish bidding phase is less competitive among the promoters since promoters are only allowed to make one offer (by closed letter), and without knowing the bid offers of the other promoters. On one hand, prices in Spain may not be as low as in Portugal, but on the other hand, winning an auction in Spain is much more uncertain than in Portugal since promoters have a much lesser active role.
In both countries, operators with an awarded bid must provide a performance bond of 60,000€ p/MW and are subject to a strict schedule and the compliance of certain millstones, starting with obtaining the necessary construction licenses and permits. Failure to comply with these obligations would result in the loss of the bond provided after the awarding. The Spanish auction granted, on average, longer deadlines for the compliance of these obligations.
Summarizing the differences between the two countries in relation to solar auctions:
- The Spanish auction system allows existing installations to participate, while the Portuguese system only new ones.
- The Portuguese auctions contain various types of remuneration, which allow investors to tailor proposals according to the preferable business model, whereas the Spanish system only permits a fixed guaranteed tariff structure. Also, the Portuguese fixed remuneration scheme offers a 15-year period and the Spanish 12-year period only.
- The energy storage appears to be more attractive in Portugal than in Spain since the storage bids are granted a capacity payment in exchange for hedging the Portuguese electricity system against high market prices. This capacity payment has been a real advantage for storage bids since the storage system itself was almost free of constraints to operate on the different markets.
- The Portuguese bidding phase is more competitive than the Spanish closed offer system, since it allows promoters to make several bids competing directly and simultaneously with other promoters. Even though bid prices in Spain are higher than in Portugal, Portuguese Promoters have a more active role and influence the auction prices.
What next?
To achieve decarbonization goals, promotion of renewable energies is paramount. Given the privileged geography and the investment in solar energy of these two countries, we can only expect that new solar auctions follow this year and in the upcoming years taking into account that the auction system ensures for a number of advantages, namely: (i) limitation of investor’s risk (ii) economic efficiency of the winning projects, and (iii) achievement of energy policy goals.
In Portugal, the Government intends to continue to hold solar auctions in the coming years, but there are still no dates for the new solar tenders in 2021. Even so, according to the goals outlined in the PNEC, the country aims to achieve a solar installed capacity of 6,6 GW in 2025, and 9 GW in 2030. In a scenario of strong demand for production licenses and shortage of reception capacity in the grid, auctions will be the main way to meet this demand and to speed investment in new capacity.
The next Portuguese solar auction this year will include floating power plants on reservoirs to circumvent availability of land limitations as well as to reduce costs related to land rights’ acquisition.
In parallel, the Portuguese Government has already announced that it will move forward with the first green hydrogen auctions in 2021, which will not be targeted to producers, but to potential and future consumers of green hydrogen. The outline presentation of the green hydrogen auctions will be made public in the first week of April. Auctions for offshore wind energy in Portugal are also expected to be launched in the near future.
As for Spain, the auction schedule appears to be substantially more solid, with the Spanish government committing to launching one auction per year in the next four years: 4,600 MW in 2022; 6,400 MW in 2023; 8,200 MW in 2024; and 10,000 MW in 2025.
Earlier in February, the Spanish Government approved an entirely new Energy Storage Strategy (Estrategia de Almacenamiento Energético), which is seen as key to the security of supply, the decrease of energy prices and the transition to an emission-neutral economy. The Strategy sets ten lines of action and 66 measures including storage in the energy system, circular economy, energy communities and ways for citizens to participate, green hydrogen promotion, creation of new business models with the intent of recycling and getting a second life out of batteries, plus policies to remove administrative barriers to facilitate new projects.
Currently, the storage available in Spain comes largely from pumped hydrogen and concentrated solar power (CSP) plants, that the Spanish Government intends to replace with large-scale batteries (at least 400 MW by 2030). The Strategy includes making the most of using the energy available from electric vehicles (26 GWh per year by 2030), additional storage capacity behind the meter as well as utility-scale storage provided by CSP plants. The Strategy predicts the storage capacity will increase from the current 8.3GW level to 20GW by 2030 and to 30GW by 2050 (including both utility-scale and distributed storage). These storage levels were set considering the decarbonization objectives established in the Spanish national energy and climate plan 2021-2030 (Plan Nacional Integrado de Energía y Clima or ’PNIEC’), which sets the share of renewable energy in energy consumption at 42% by the end of the decade. The Strategy follows the obligations taken on under the Paris Agreement as well, and pursues the design modernizing goals of electricity markets, that the European Commission has been developing under the Clean Energy Package for all Europeans (CEP).
But how ambitious is this Strategy and how advanced is Spain in implementing an energy storage policy when compared to Portugal and other EU countries?
The Portuguese National Energy and Climate Plan 2030 (Plano Nacional de Energia e Clima or ‘PNEC’) envisages an increase in storage capacity, first through hydro pumps and, towards 2030, with the contribution of hydrogen and batteries. Presently, the most developed and promising electric energy storage technology is the use of reversible pumping in hydroelectric plants, with efficiency ratios around 70-80%. However, in the Portuguese 2020 solar auction, 8 of the 12 lots awarded, have already included storage, representing 483 MW, almost 75% of the granted capacity (670 MW).
But, like Portugal, Spain has not yet introduced specific connection rules and tariffs to storage projects. France has recently included a proper definition of energy storage in its regulatory framework to address the issue of connection rules for storage in the near future and a specific target has been defined for the development of pumped hydrogen storage: the expansion of 1 to 2 GW in 2025-2030.
Currently, the European market for Batteries and Energy Storage Systems (BESS) is led by Germany, where energy storage facilities have been near renewable energy-based power plants, as this combination leads to an advantage concerning market premium for the installations plus improved profitability.
Un viento tributario que viene de España
Todo empieza en año de 2013, cuando en España se publica la Ley 15/2012, de 27 de diciembre (modificada posteriormente por la Ley 9/2013, de 13 de julio), creando un impuesto especial del 7% cobrado a los productores de electricidad: el Impuesto al Valor de la Producción de la Energía Eléctrica (IVPEE). Le siguió en Portugal el Decreto-Ley 74/2013, de 4 de junio (la "Ley de Clawback") estableciendo un mecanismo con la finalidad anunciada de corregir los desequilibrios entre los productores de electricidad, causados por distorsiones derivadas de acontecimientos en otros Estados miembros de la Unión Europea.
El impuesto energético español ha generado mucha controversia judicial. El Tribunal Supremo español argumentó la ilegalidad de este mecanismo al considerar que este impuesto no sería exclusivamente un impuesto medioambiental, ya que gravaría indiscriminadamente a todos los productores de energía. Además, creaba un posible problema de doble imposición con el Impuesto de Actividades Económicas al que ya estaba sometida la producción de energía. Sin embargo, el Tribunal Constitucional español rechazó este entendimiento y se pronunció por la adecuación del impuesto energético a la Constitución española. El asunto llegó al Tribunal de Justicia de la Unión Europea y España arriesga un caos en las cuentas de su sistema eléctrico si el TJUE se pronuncia en contra el IVPEE (el cual vale 1.500 millones de euros al año, habiendo sido ya recaudado en el entorno de los 10 mil millones de euros desde 2013) dando razón a quienes entienden que su verdadera naturaleza es la de un impuesto indirecto sin finalidad específica, con exclusiva voluntad recaudatoria.
En 2018, las autoridades españolas decidieron suspender el impuesto sobre la energía durante seis meses con el fin de reducir los precios de la electricidad para los consumidores. Esta decisión fue temporal y aparentemente contraproducente. El impuesto sobre la energía se volvió a efectivar en 2019.
Con la creación del IVPEE, las compañías eléctricas españolas habrán aumentado sus precios de mayorista impactando en el precio del mercado en OMIE (el mercado diario del MIBEL), lo que supuestamente benefició a los productores portugueses integrados en el mismo mercado y que no pagaban el impuesto español, recibiendo así beneficios inesperados.
Portugal responde
En Portugal, el Gobierno impuso una tasa a la producción de energía (el "Clawback") de 6,5/MWh, mediante la Orden nº 11566-A/2015, de 3 de octubre, que la Orden número 9955/2017, disminuiría a 4,75 euros/MWh. Esto se hizo al amparo de la Ley de Clawback, con el citado argumento de que los productores portugueses estaban recibiendo beneficios extraordinarios. Dicha Orden nunca llegó a aplicarse por falta de mecanismos de cálculo del Clawback.
El Decreto-Ley 104/2019, de 9 de agosto, modifica la Ley de Clawback permitiendo un prepago para mitigar temporalmente el desfase entre la comprobación del hecho externo (en este caso, la comprobación de que el impuesto energético español sigue vigente) y la respectiva compensación (es decir, el Clawback portugués). También permitió ajustar el evento externo a la tecnología de producción de electricidad en la que se centra, para evitar distorsiones de aplicación indiferenciada a las diferentes fuentes de producción de energía. Es importante destacar que el nuevo artículo 1.º-A de la Ley de Clawback estableció expresamente que los clawback se aplican a los productores de electricidad.
En el Decreto 282/2019, de 30 de julio fue requerido que ERSE, el regulador del mercado energético portugués, presentase, anualmente, un informe sobre el impacto en la formación del precio medio de la electricidad en el mercado mayorista portugués para medidas y eventos registrados en la Unión Europea. El ERSE publicó su primer informe en septiembre de 2019, en el que consideraba que la reinstauración del impuesto energético español era un evento que podía causar un desequilibrio en el mercado que requería una compensación a través del mecanismo de clawback.
En consecuencia, el Clawback aplicable a los productores portugueses respecto a la producción de energía se fijó en el valor en 6,27 euros/MWh para 2018 y en 4,18 euros/MWh para 2019, mediante la Orden número 8521/2019, de 26 de septiembre.
El prepago para 2020 se ajustó a 2,24 EUR/MWh mediante la Orden número 6740/2020, de 30 de junio, para internalizar hechos locales que afectaron al Sistema Eléctrico Nacional ("SEN") como la fiscalidad de los productos petrolíferos y de la energía; la contribución extraordinaria sobre el sector energético y; la tarifa social de la electricidad.
Resoluciones y aclaraciones
Toda esta compleja producción normativa suscitó muchas dudas entre los productores, primero sobre cómo funcionarían los mecanismos de clawback, ya que en la versión inicial de la Ley de Clawback faltaban las herramientas para calcular el importe que se cobraría a los productores. Posteriormente, sobre a quién se aplicaría el Clawback.
La Secretaría de Estado de Energía portuguesa emitió el 16 de diciembre de 2019 una resolución (la "Resolución") en la que se establece, en primer lugar, que la activación del mecanismo de la Ley Clawback se limita a eventos externos al SEN con efectos en la formación de los precios de mayorista en OMIE; en segundo lugar, que todos los productores eléctricos que vendan electricidad a un precio por referencia a OMIE, independientemente de la fuente primaria utilizada por las respectivas centrales, estarían cubiertos por este régimen.
Por otro lado, los productores eléctricos que operan centrales eléctricas con una retribución que no depende directamente del mercado diario del MIBEL no están cubiertos por este mecanismo, aunque participen en el OMIE, siempre que los ingresos obtenidos por las respectivas centrales estén predeterminados en los respectivos contratos de desinversión, y no varíen en función de la evolución de los precios en el mercado diario del MIBEL.
El mismo entendimiento debe aplicarse a los contratos de compra de energía entre los productores de electricidad que no se benefician de ningún mecanismo de retribución fija y los clientes finales/suministradores, para la entrega física de la electricidad en un punto concreto, a un precio determinado, ya que no generarán ningún beneficio inesperado.
Pero si generan algún beneficio inesperado, aunque el artículo 1.º-A de la Ley de Clawback sólo establecía que este cargo se aplicaría a los productores de electricidad, la Resolución extiende el Clawback también a los suministradores, a las empresas comercializadoras de electricidad.
En una aclaración adicional, con fecha de 27 de julio de 2020 (la Aclaración"), la Secretaría de Estado de Energía portuguesa determinó que en el caso en que el suministrador adquiera electricidad de un productor en virtud de un PPA a precio fijo para venderla en OMIE, recibiendo el respectivo precio marginal como retorno, se producirá un aumento de la ganancia con la naturaleza de un beneficio inesperado en la esfera del proveedor, que debe estar sujeto al mecanismo de la Ley de Clawback. En estos casos, el proveedor deberá abonar el importe del cargo de Clawback al productor, siendo éste el responsable de entregarlo a la REN (que, como operador de la red de transporte, ha sido elegida como responsable de la recaudación del cargo de Clawback).
Se pierde la confianza en los reguladores
Cuando creó el Clawback utilizando la Ley de Clawback para ese efecto, el Gobierno portugués (y ERSE) asumió que una variación en la fiscalidad española de la energía crea una ventaja extra-mercado en Portugal que tiene que ser contrarrestada a través del mecanismo de la Ley de Clawback.
Esta suposición es, cuando menos, discutible. La intención declarada (otra podría ser la oculta) de la Ley de Clawback era proteger el mercado eléctrico mediante la corrección de distorsiones no originadas en el entorno del propio mercado. Pero, por su naturaleza, no podemos incluir en tales distorsiones las causadas por cualquier acción voluntaria de los Gobiernos ibéricos, especialmente si esas acciones toman la forma de un impuesto. Las diferencias entre los impuestos portugueses y españoles no son susceptibles de ser equilibradas por el simple mecanismo de clawback creado por la Ley de Clawback: los tipos de IVA más bajos aplicables en España, son un buen ejemplo, ya que no han causado ni deben causar que el Gobierno portugués ofrezca ningún incentivo a los productores de energía portugueses para contrarrestar el tipo más alto del IVA portugués.
Cualquier carga impuesta a los productores o proveedores de energía portugueses para equilibrar un nuevo impuesto sobre la energía en España es, en esencia, un nuevo impuesto en Portugal, una carga impuesta generalmente por el Estado portugués sobre un tipo específico de transacciones: en nuestro caso, la venta de energía cuando se vende en OMIE o a un precio relacionado con OMIE. En España se ha cuestionado qué tipo de impuesto es el IVPEE, pero nunca hubo dudas sobre la naturaleza tributaria de esta contribución sustancialmente idéntica al Clawback (aunque con un alcance más amplio) que los productores de energía han sido llamados a pagar.
Los artículos 165.º y siguientes de la Constitución portuguesa establecen que todo nuevo impuesto, toda modificación del ámbito de aplicación de un impuesto o de los sujetos pasivos y de los tipos impositivos requiere la promulgación de una ley formal del Parlamento portugués. En consecuencia, cualquier tasa creada al amparo de la Ley de Clawback (que, por cierto, es un Decreto-ley promulgado por el Gobierno portugués en el marco de sus competencias legislativas, y no por el Parlamento) que se corresponda materialmente con un nuevo impuesto, como ocurre con el Clawback, viola la Constitución portuguesa.
Para empeorar las cosas, la Resolución y la Aclaración modifican el Clawback y lo extendien a las comercializadoras de energía eléctrica, haciendo tabla rasa del artículo 1.º-A de la Ley de Clawback, que establece claramente que sólo los productores están sujetos al mecanismo de Clawback, sin referencia a las comercializadas. La Resolución y la Aclaración han venido a luz en el marco de las competencias ejecutivas de la Secretaría de Estado de Energía portuguesa, lo que añade una segunda capa de problemas constitucionales y jurídicos: la Secretaría de Estado de Energía portuguesa no tiene competencia legal para pronunciarse sobre el alcance y sobre la base (objetiva y subjetiva) imponible del Clawback, esta competencia pertenece al Parlamento portugués; tampoco tiene competencia para modificar un decreto-ley dictado por el Gobierno.
Esta larga sucesión de acontecimientos, que hemos intentado resumir en este artículo, penaliza la competitividad del mercado eléctrico portugués con un impuesto aleatorio que, un día se aplica sólo a los productores y a un determinado tipo de transacciones, pero al día siguiente puede aplicarse a diferentes tipos de transacciones y a otros agentes del mercado, con tipos impositivos variables e imprevisibles, todo ello por decisión de un miembro del Gobierno. El Clawback no solamente socava la creación de un mercado de PPAs financieros en Portugal, privando a todos los agentes del mercado de sus beneficios; sino que añade, en un momento en el que Portugal está haciendo un enorme esfuerzo para fomentar la producción solar fotovoltaica nacional, un alto grado de preocupación, especialmente entre los agentes del mercado de las renovables que ya no saben qué esperar de los responsables portugueses de la fiscalidad de la energía.
La imposición del Clawback se hace una manera que, en nuestra opinión, desatiende los límites para protección de todos los ciudadanos establecidos en la Constitución portuguesa en materia de impuestos. Y, lo más importante, pone en causa el estado de derecho (el principio del rule of law) que damos por adquirido en países democráticos, pero que en estos días vemos puesto en causa donde menos esperamos.