EU’s energy legislation

Another crucial aspect to be mentioned about the EU’s energy security is the energy legislation focused on oil and gas. I will try to explore whether the EU’s energy legislation manages to achieve and maintain energy security.

In general, the EU supply security and energy law is explained in Lisbon Treaty in article 194 TFEU to be the competence divided between the EU and member states (Marhold 2021, p. 29).

The main goal of this article is to state the problem of ensuring energy security for the energy consumers with the help of the EU energy market. Unlike Russia, the EU strives to provide its

21 member states with the liberalised and competitive energy sector, that goal is to provide the member states with affordable energy sources.

Moreover, the EU in Lisbon Treaty in the same article defines its energy priorities as ensuring the functioning of the internal energy market and promoting the interconnection of the internal energy infrastructure.

The EU implements secondary legislation (regulations and directives) focused on the area of oil and gas (Hughes 2016, p. 42).

In 2015 the EU proposed the creation of the European Energy Union that proves the significance of the EU’s energy security (Leal-Arcas 2016, p.1). One of the points mentioned in the Energy Union package (2015, p.5) is that the EU should find ways of reducing oil consumption. Secondly, there is an intention to provide the member states with a more competitive internal gas market.

Another document related to oil is the Oil Stock Directive. It obliges the member states to provide themselves with minimum oil reserves (equal to 100 days of net crude oil imports) to recover from supply disruption. The availability of these oil reserves is vital for ensuring the energy security of the oil supply.

Speaking of the gas, the European Commission (EC) proposed to create stronger cooperation of the member states to get over the potential disruption of gas supply. For instance, this proposal concerns the states' solidarity and reliability on each other in any gas supply disruption.

In addition, there is a Gas Regulation or Regulation of the EU 2017/1938, which guarantees the security of the natural gas supply. The main goal is to ensure an uninterrupted supply of gas in the EU.

Another necessary legislation is the Gas Directive (2009). This directive has its primary goal to create an internal liberated gas market and efficient network for gas distribution. Another goal is to ensure non-discriminatory third-party access to the EU’s internal gas market (Hughes 2016, p. 43).

It is vital to mention that the EU focused more on internal energy legislation and its internal energy policy or energy governance (Leal-Arcas 2015, p. 215). On the other hand, the EU should concern more about external energy legislation and policy to maintain its energy security of supply.

22 The main goal of the internal energy policy is to create a competitive internal energy market (primarily it concerns gas), promote energy efficiency, and fasten the process of decarbonisation. The energy efficiency of the EU must decrease consumption and increase energy savings. These matters are explored in The Energy Efficiency Directive (2021) which mentions above all gas and oil used for providing energy. One of the main reasons for proposing energy efficiency is that it decreases the costs of energy due to efficiently saved and used energy sources.

The EU implements the strategy for decarbonisation, which means decreasing greenhouse emissions and transition to cleaner energy sources. Nevertheless, the energy share of oil and gas remains almost the half of total energy consumption of the EU. So that is why it is necessary to bear in mind the importance of oil and gas in the energy law-making and energy policy of the EU.

The EU mostly concentrated on their internal energy legislation, but on the other hand, there are also law implementations in the EU external energy policy. As mentioned above, in the Gas Directive there is a part that explains the third-party access to the internal gas market. In 2017 as its response to the new project installation of Nord Stream 2, the EC proposed a new directive to enlarge the Gas Directive. The Directive 2019/692 explores the matter of the gas pipelines between the EU and third countries. The main goal of the directive is the transparency of the legal framework so to ensure investors and market actors the certainty and maintain energy security of gas supply. Furthermore, any kind of agreement between the EU and third countries should be compatible with the EU energy law. The purpose of such changes was primarily the intention of the EU to influence the Nord Stream 2 project to maintain its energy security and minimise the geopolitical impact of Russia through its natural resources on the internal gas market of the EU.

Speaking of member states, they have the right to implement their chosen energy policies (Szulecki 2017, p. 189). For instance, the Lisbon Treaty gives the member states the right to determine the number of energy sources needed for energy consumption and the energy mix used for satisfying their energy needs. Each member state implements the goals of energy security stated by the EU in different ways.

To summarise all the mentioned information above, we may conclude that the EU as a net importer of energy sources bear in mind the energy security of supply. In addition, the biggest