Community initiative concerning transmission and distribution networks for energy which Member States are invited to establish (REGEN), 1990-1993

At its meeting on 12 December 1990, the Commission of the European Communities decided to establish a Community initiative (REGEN) in favour of regions whose development is lagging behind (Objective 1 regions) and which are inadequately equipped with energy infrastructures. The initiative should contribute to improving the competitivity of economic activities, especially industry, in the regions concerned, enable them to benefit more fully from the establishment of an internal market in energy, help create the conditions for a more effective management and greater security of energy supplies in the Community as a whole, and contribute, where natural gas supplies are introduced, to a reduction in pollution related to the use of energy.
To accelerate the creation of infrastructures for the reception and transmission of natural gas in peripheral regions where these do not presently exist, and to accelerate the completion of Community-wide networks for the transmission and distribution of gas and exceptionally electricity so as to ensure appropriate interconnections between peripheral regions and the rest of the Community.
Five projects:

- The creation of reception facilities and transmission networks for the introduction of natural gas in regions of Portugal and of Greece;

- The establishment of an interconnection between the gas transmission networks of the Republic of Ireland and those of the United Kingdom;

- The inclusion of the Island of Corsica in a possible future interconnection between gas transmission networks on the mainland of Italy and a transmission network to be established on the Island of Sardinia;

- The establishment of an interconnection between gas transmission systems in Portugal and those in Spain;

- The establishment of an interconnection between electricity distribution networks in Italy and those in Greece.
The Commission is responsible for the implementation of the initiative.

Projects submitted under this initiative are jointly financed by the Member State and the Community and loans are also provided by the European Investment Bank and the European Coal and Steel Community. The Community's contribution takes account, in particular, of the estimate of the Commission's services, in consultation with the European Investment Bank, of the work that is likely to be carried out in the period 1990 to 1993, and the requirements for Community payment credits for budgetary assistance that results, where relevant in addition to those that are already provided for in Community support frameworks, and an assessment of the financial plans for these projects, so as to ensure the appropriate balance between grant and loan finance.

The Commission makes available technical assistance as required in relation to the design, financing and implementation of projects in the framework of the initiative. Requests put forward under this initiative should identify clearly any eventual requirements for complementary investment elsewhere in the Community's energy transmission and distribution networks necessary for the proper operation of the interconnections which it is intended to establish either in the period 1990 to 1993 or subsequently. Community assistance is conditional upon there being adequate undertakings by the responsible authorities that these complementary investments are programmed to take place in a timely fashion.