Iberian leaders agree to negotiate energy interconnections with France

4 months ago 18

Portugal and Spain have agreed to participate jointly in meetings with France on energy interconnections, arguing that the issue is a European one and not just one between the Iberian peninsula and France, the environment ministers announced on Wednesday.

This statement from the Portuguese and Spanish leaders follows a meeting between the two on various topics, including the environment, water management and energy.

“We have agreed to be present together at the negotiation meetings with France and to ask the European Commission that this is a European issue and not an issue of the Iberian Peninsula with France,” said the Portuguese Environment and Energy Minister Maria da Graça Carvalho at a joint conference with Ecological Transition Minister Teresa Ribera at the Environment Ministry for the environment in Lisbon.

Da Graça Carvalho, who met her Spanish counterpart for the third time in three months, argued that the issue of energy interconnection was also of great importance for the countries at the heart of Europe.

“If we want a European market, this issue has to be resolved, and it’s a European issue, and we’ll be talking to Mrs [Ursula] von der Leyen, who we hope will be re-elected [president of the European Commission] on the 18th, so that she can help us in this endeavour of the European electricity and energy market,” said the Portuguese minister.

Ribera recalled that during the energy crisis, aggravated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Spain and Portugal were unable to help other European countries “because they had weak interconnections” with the rest of Europe.

Portugal and Spain are developing a project to increase interconnection capacity between the northern regions of Minho and Galicia, allowing the Iberian electricity market (Mibel) to function more efficiently, and there are also plans for links between Spain and France, via the Bay of Biscay.

The gas pipeline between the Spanish city of Barcelona and the French city of Marseille (BarMar) to transport energy between the Iberian Peninsula and France has been announced for 2022, and it is estimated that it could take five to seven years to build.

In October 2022, Portugal and Spain agreed with France to build new links to transport green hydrogen, one between Celorico da Beira and Zamora (CelZa) and the other between Barcelona and Marseille (BarMar), in a project called H2MED.

(Maria João Pereira | Lusa.pt)