ENTSOE Role in Transmission Network Planning Following the Provisons of the EU's Third Energy Package

In the initial period of its operation the European network of transmission system operators for electricity (ENTSO-E) has prepared and published the first edition of its ten-year network development plan (TYNDP) for period 2010-2020, by which has fulfilled one of the ENTSO-E's tasks according to the new Directive 714/09/EZ on grid accessing conditions for cross-border electricity exchange. In this process, ENTSO-E has carried out a broad public debates, which provided, together with general reactions of a number of major European power industry stakeholders, expectations regarding new editions of this non-binding paper (TYNDP), which followed every two years. Following these experiences, and the experiences of individual transmission system operators as participants of making TYNDP ''pilot'' through ENTSO-E, a plan and a time schedule of activities were adopted until the publication of the next TYNDP in the spring of 2012. Important step in this represents parallel preparation and creation of six regional investment plans (RIP) in order to reduce the scope of activities at the pan-European TYNDP level and to ensure their consistency. Namely among this six regions agreed between transmission system operators, which are members of ENTSO-E, there are certain overlaps in the area which they include (and thus in included projects). One of the three main reasons for launching investment projects in new or reconstructed transmission facilities which are covered with TYNDP or RIP is the integration of electricity market. Therefore is, within the methodology improvement of making TYNDP or RIP, further expanded treatment of input data, especially in terms of market-relevant data and data needed for modeling electricity market and its impact on investment in the transmission system. Also, additional scenarios that are used by all RIP are defined, where the most important scenario is so called 20-20-20 which as the basic input parameters takes National investment plans whose preparation is required by Directive 2009/28 on promoting the use of electricity produced from renewable energy sources. These models are used for analysis at regional level. Preliminary results provide some regional trends, but also the common elements at the pan-European level. In doing so, certain critical are discussed at special ENTSO-E workshops and with interested stakeholders, first of all market participants. (author)