CFF48A17 9E23 41DF 82CF 3BA421C86606Under the new EU draft Directive authorisations granted under national law for the construction and operation of existing natural gas pipelines and other network assets will be grandfathered in the administrative permit granting processes for the deployment of hydrogen production facilities and hydrogen system infrastructure.

 

According to the draft law conditions for these licences in case of such repurposing must not materially change as compared to natural gas.


On 15 December 2021 the European Commission proposed new EU framework to decarbonise gas markets and promote hydrogen, consisting of:

 
- Proposal for a Directive of the European Parliament Parliament and of the Council on common rules for the internal markets in renewable and natural gases and in hydrogen, COM/2021/803 final,
 
- Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament Parliament and of the Council on the internal markets for renewable and natural gases and for hydrogen (recast), COM/2021/804 final.

 

Some of envisioned measures are quite useful and may significantly impact hydrogen infrastructure investment process.

 

For example, in Recital 47 of the draft Directive we can find grandfathering of authorisations granted under national law for the construction and operation of existing natural gas pipelines and other network assets as an important simplification of administrative permit granting processes for the deployment of hydrogen production facilities and hydrogen system infrastructure.

 

The draft explains that “grandfathering of authorisations (such as licences, permissions, concessions or approvals), granted under national law for the construction and operation of existing natural gas pipelines and other network assets, is needed once the transported gaseous energy carrier in a gas pipeline changes from natural gas to (pure) hydrogen. This should prevent undue delay in repurposing existing natural gas pipelines and other networks assets for hydrogen transport”.

 

What is equally vital from practical point of view the draft mandates that “ it should be avoided that conditions for granting authorisations for hydrogen system infrastructure are materially different unless sufficiently justified”.

 

Differentiated approach in grandfathering existing or issuing new authorisations may be justified by technical safety considerations only.

 

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