Energy data: What the sector thinks about EU legislation

What limitations on data use have resulted from EU legislation and can be offered as recommendations? Enlit Europe Data Working Group members comment.

Data is arguably the most important driver of the energy transition underpinning the development of new services for customers, the operation of the networks and ultimately the business models of the many players.

The EU directives and legislation are key for defining at a European level the many new requirements around data in this new energy world but it is continually evolving. At the Enlit Europe Data Working Group’s first meeting, members present responded to limitations on data that have been experienced in their companies’ real world settings.

Manuel Galvez, European Affairs lead, Elia: “We have good guidelines such as the Clean Energy package but these take time to translate. We now need a bold push at European level to enable access not only to smart metering data but also to behind the meter data. We need collaboration between the different players across several sectors to see how practically we can get access to that data without stepping on everybody’s toes.”

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Francisco Puente, Director, Escan Energy Consulting: “The main barrier we have experienced is the real life application of directives when transposing them to country and lower levels, which often lack clarity. Perhaps this could be improved by wider interaction with national, regional and local stakeholders, in workshops or roundtables, having as an output roadmaps or guidelines for their practical application.”

Luis Cunha, Director of European Policies and Projects, E-Redes: “It’s about connecting the dots. There are a lot of new roles and technologies and players but I don’t see these being connected. We need to make ourselves understandable to each other and to exchange data in order to tie everything together and bring the ecosystem view. A cost-effective operation of the system depends on external data that should be made available without restrictions.”

Sandra Melki, Industry Executive - Energy & Utilities, Microsoft France: “The EC has a role to play in order to encourage data sharing and collaboration, not only within the energy sector but more broadly to include all the new stakeholders within the value chain. The Commission also has an important role to play to foster innovation in countries adapting the legislation to enable actors to act within a clear framework”

Ana Trbovich, COO of Grid Singularity: “The EU directives are sometimes more progressive than the implementation. A case in point is the energy community legislation, where most EU members still have not allowed peer-to-peer trading and have generally underexploited progressive EU directives in this field to democratise energy markets. We also hope that the current policy discussion around an energy asset registry will opt for a distributed rather than centralised technology solution to ensure market interoperability and efficiency.”

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Sergio Lazzarotto, Executive Director, DLMS User Association: “It is important to have legislation that is proactive and benefits the industry with the goal of preventing monopolistic situations and building on existing recognised standards. If we want to open and share data, the industry, represented by the standardisation bodies, the regulatory environment and the legislative community, needs to move in parallel and collaborate, encourage progress and innovation and evangelise how data can be accessed in a standardised way.”

Arjan Haring, researcher, Jheronimus Academy of Data Science: “I am mostly concerned with work on ethical AI but moving forward we need to put the customer in there. This discipline, human-centred AI, is now getting traction and I hope that this combining of the technology push with the values of European citizens becomes a focus in the EU and a part of the legislation.”