Law and regulationEvent
Act strengthening the state's gas security: storage development plan and emergency states
The Act of 5 August 2022 introduces a plan for developing storage capacity, procedures for declaring emergency states and penalties for exceeding gas offtake restrictions. It enters into force on 1 September 2022.
Other language versions: polski.
The Act of 5 August 2022 amending certain acts to strengthen the state's gas security in connection with the situation on the gas market (Journal of Laws (Dz.U.) 2022, item 1723) enters into force on 1 September 2022. It introduces 10-year plans for developing storage capacity, streamlined procedures for declaring gas emergencies, and rules for restricting gas fuel offtake together with penalties for exceeding them. The rules do not concern biogas or biomethane directly, but they shape the market in which these will operate.
What is changing
The most important elements of the act:
| Area | Solution |
|---|---|
| Storage | storage system operators prepare a 10-year capacity development plan; the first by 30 September 2022, updated every 2 years |
| Emergency states | the minister declares a state of threat or emergency by regulation on the basis of information from the operator; the operator may apply for the release of compulsory stocks |
| Offtake restrictions | the Council of Ministers may introduce restrictions on gas offtake for a specified period |
| Penalties | for exceeding capacity during a period of restrictions: multiples of the fixed transmission charge (10× and 15×), and for customers without capacity metering, flat-rate penalties from PLN 1,000 to PLN 20,000 |
| Balancing | settlement in gas days (6:00–6:00) with cost neutrality |
A separate set of provisions concerns the conversion of high-nitrogen gas to high-methane gas: customers bear the costs of adapting their installations, with exceptions for certain categories, and the operator may include the costs in the tariff. Supplies may be suspended to customers who do not allow the work to be carried out.
Significance for the industry in Poland
For the biogas industry the act is evidence that security of supply is becoming a task of the state, requiring plans, penalties and accountability. In many places the grid still carries high-nitrogen gas, and conversion to high-methane gas changes the conditions for injecting new sources into it. Biomethane with natural gas parameters is chemically close to high-methane gas, which facilitates the connection of such installations during grid conversion.
Biogas plants producing electricity and heat from their own biogas are, as a rule, not customers covered by restrictions on gas offtake from the grid (it may be different where an installation draws gas from the system), but changes in market rules affect gas and energy prices, and therefore the profitability of investments.
Who the rules affect in practice
The greatest impact will be on system operators, gas suppliers and industrial customers, who must reckon with restriction procedures and penalties. Households are protected first, but responsibility for preparing plans and infrastructure falls on operators. For companies using high-nitrogen gas, the conversion schedule and the costs of adapting equipment are important. It is worth asking the grid operator about planned dates and scope of work and about how costs will be settled.
What next
Storage operators are preparing development plans, and the regulator will approve them. For the industry, subsequent implementing regulations will matter, as will the way the system takes local gas sources, including biomethane, into account in demand analyses and grid development plans.
Sources
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