Seminar

The purpose of the workshop was to explore whether and what regulatory developments are required to facilitate the grid development necessary to unlock the renewable energy portfolio of North Africa - for local use and for international exchange.
Drawing on experience from off-shore projects like Britnet, the Spanish-Morocco interconnector or the UK off-shore grid, as much as on grid expansion in EU and MENA countries a common framework was first discussed to characterize the various challenges that need to be addressed to facilitate grid expansion. This will be informed by a set of stakeholder interviews DIW pursued with financial support from DII.
The main focus was a discussion to what extent different business models and institutional options can address the set of challenges that needs to be tackled. This involved a more detailed discussion on how such options need to be structured to best address the needs of EU-MENA energy projects.
With the combination of a conceptual framework with very specific examples the workshop explored the next steps of regulatory developments and how they do match a longer-term vision. It is thus of relevance for the current discussion on the EU infrastructure package, the further development of institutions to support the EU-MENA energy cooperation, and national regulatory developments in EU and MENA countries.