The role of competition authorities and sectoral regulators in supervising the liberalisation of energy markets

The opening to competition of the markets in gas and electricity has hardly produced the desired impact. To a large extent, the directives flowing from the third package have been transposed amongst the Member States. However, the effective implementation of a European energy is still facing several challenges ahead. With this nebulous background, supervision has become all-seeing, Argus-like. In fact, while competitions authorities and sectoral regulators are significantly stepping up theirs efforts so as to push forward the liberalisation process towards the swift completion of the internal energy market, they seem, at times, to work against the grain of their original assignment. On the one hand, competition authorities appear to be increasingly willing to act as « builders » for the energy markets as they tackle market structures rather than harmful behaviours. Conversely, sectoral regulators, with their ever-strengthening powers, are more and more incited to track down and take sanctions against barriers to competition. Such bicephalous management has resulted in a confusion of roles which has not been alleviated by the « bridges » built between both types of regulators. At any rate, in the face of such a tangled web of competences, operators find themselves in markets that are not very conducive to competition and in a regulatory framework which is both volatile and complex, thereby paralysing the investments required to render such markets more dynamic. The system as it stands may still be improved and many would like to see it clarified.