Schuman Project contribution                                                    Your comments
to debate on European Commission Green Paper below:

 
EUROPEAN COMMISSION 
 

DIRECTORATE-GENERAL FOR ENERGY AND TRANSPORT 
200 rue de la Loi, B-1049 Brussels, Belgium. Fax: +32 2 295 6105 

 

Towards a European strategy for the security of energy supply

The Green Paper Towards a European strategy for the security of energy supply was adopted by the European Commission on 29 November 2000. The Commission hereby invites anybody who, after reading the text, would like to react to it to submit their comments or proposals.
 

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Schuman Project contribution to the debate on the Green Paper
 Towards a European strategy for the security of energy supply
 
EU's Trillion Dollar Disaster:
energy non-policy
Name David Heilbron Price
Organisation Bron Communications, Schuman Project. 

© 20011207. Permission given for web first use only of these comments. 
All rights reserved.

What are you areas of interest? Origin, present and future of Europe. Research on the work and thought of Robert Schuman, founder of the EU. Application of the Community or supranational method for the security and peace of Europe and beyond. Technological innovation in the energy field, ecology. The Schuman Project is conducting independent research and is receiving no funding from European institutions, other organisations or any company.
Contact person D H Price
E-Mail Info@schuman.info 

Web site: www.schuman.info 

Telephone +322 230 7621
Fax +322 230 7621
Address For correspondence: 55 rue de Mot, B-1040 Brussels
Please add your answers after the question(s) which deal most closely with the subject(s) on which you wish to comment so that the Commission can deal with the remarks efficiently and swiftly.
 
 1. Can the European Union accept an increase in its dependence on external energy sources without compromising its security of supply and European competitiveness? For which sources of energy would it be appropriate, if this were the case, to foresee a framework policy for imports? In this context, is it appropriate to favour an economic approach: energy cost; or geopolitical approach: risk of disruption? 

Answer: A. Energy Destiny. Europe must be able to deal with its own ‘Energy Destiny’. It can no longer remain a passive victim of recurring shocks from speculation or international politics. In the past energy has been used as a weapon; it must become an instrument of peace and fairness for both importer and exporter. The Coal and Steel Community initiated by Robert Schuman helped resolve internal energy problems, the cause of earlier hostilities. Since the 1950s European states have suffered from increasingly severe external problems without taking Community action. The 1970s were the decade of a disastrous energy crisis. After the 11 September 2001 terror attacks in the USA, the risks are even greater today. Energy imports are surging, while our own energy sources are depleting fast. Yet  the European population's increased vulnerability vies with European governments' complacency and amnesia. Policy incoherence of the EU15 will multiply with the adhesion of the candidate countries. 

What should the EU do? The step-by-step means to provide a real energy security policy (based on proven experience) are described in two books (copies of which have been given to the Commission): New Cold War or Common European Home? and Russia and the danger for the European Union
Details are to be found on www.schuman.info 

As distinct from a reaction policy after the next crisis that will cost a great deal mind and money, all participants can immediately benefit from creating an Energy Community solution. The EU experience proves this. After the world war,  the European Community replaced revenge, hate and yet another war with long-term cooperation. Energy suppliers, consumers, refining and supply companies as well as the general public and the economy overall would all gain from such a policy. 

B. The cost of no security policy. Since the Louis Armand Report to the Community in 1957, the dangers of a lack of adequate energy policy have been spelt out many times to European governments. Despite the increasingly serious crises that Europe has faced and the increasing costs for our populations, European  governments have shown an extraordinary complacency. Previous energy crises nearly brought about the collapse of the European economy. Recent events make it more than probable that Europe will face similar crises in the future. It is the duty and responsibility of the European Commission, the European Parliament and other European institutions to warn the European people and their governments of these dangers so that Community decisions can be made and a common policy can be created. 

After the world war, Europe's energy production and consumption became more and more out of balance. The most vital aspects of the economy have now become critically reliant on unstable external sources of energy. The consequences for Europe have become severe and dangerous.. 

In 1955 coal provided 75% of energy in Western Europe and oil only 22%. The Suez Crisis of 1956, in spite of emergency action of the Oil Lift, led to rationing, higher taxes, and banning of some private car driving. During the 1967 Six Day War, Arab oil, the source of three-quarters of Western Europe's oil, was cut by 60%. Coincidently civil war broke out in Nigeria, a major alternative supplier. 

In 1973 Europe suffered the impact of a violent quadrupling of energy prices. Posted oil prices of $1.80 a barrel in 1970, rose to $2.90 in early 1973 but with the application of the ‘oil weapon’ in the October war, the price hit $11.65 by the end of the year. World petroleum earnings went up from $23 billion in 1972 to $140 billion in 1977. The UK Stock Market crashed by as much as the 1929 crash but twice as fast. By 1974 the effect on Europe was as devastating as a military assault. A Soviet military publication noted it had seriously affected the West's military capacity to defend itself. With the first shock, oil costs were increasing at a rate of more than an extra trillion dollars a decade. But in 1979 the second severe oil shock struck, quadrupling prices again: spot prices hit the $40 to $50 range. It peaked in 1983 at $53. 

As a result the European economy was brought to the brink of collapse. The effect was not only economic: inflation destroyed industries, savings and pensions and created social tensions that rocked European society to the roots. Plans for European monetary union (Werner Plan) were abandoned for two decades at enormous social, economic and political cost. Europe’s vigorous growth and its huge foreign currency reserves – the largest in the world – were wiped out. 

If it had not been for the European Community, the effects of this oil crisis would have been even more catastrophic. The previous time that European states had individually undergone such an economic crash and inflation led directly to increased nationalism and a world war. The Community provided the framework and means to come to common solutions on vital interests, even though no energy policy existed. Outside the Community countries were less fortunate. Yugoslavia, stressed successively by debt, hyperinflation, then nationalism turned to bloody conflict and extermination of ethnic populations. In the developing world, the effects are still with us, massive debts, broken economies, wars and instabilities. 

Today vulnerability is reaching precarious proportions. Liquid petroleum and gas makes up nearly two-thirds of EU15 energy. But even half of its coal is also imported and this could soon reach 100% imported coal. And Europe, in spite of the euro, still buys its oil in a foreign currency, the dollar. Although the EU is an economy of comparable size to the US, its energy costs are subject to fluctuations of the US economy and US monetary policies as well as ‘the free market’ for oil. The oil producers and Europe experienced the consequences of the erosion of the US dollar by inflation and debt problems. In 1972 the dollar was taken off the gold standard and an ounce of gold bounced up from $35 in 1971 to $100 and beyond. America's postwar short-term foreign debt had risen from $7 billion in 1945 to $80 billion by the end of 1972, just before the energy crisis burst. Will the euro import inflation in the  future because of dollar monetary indiscipline? 

Are we now living in a period of stable prices, free from ‘energy shocks’? Here's what the best minds said ... and what actually happened. In Spring 1999, oil prices dropped below $10 a barrel. What was the longer-term view of practical oilmen? Three months earlier the chairman of Royal Dutch/Shell, Mark Moody-Short, had revealed a 5-year plan that assumed a price of $14 a barrel. In March 1999 he talked about moving it to $11. The chairman of another oil giant, BP-Amoco, Sir John Browne, was working on similar assumptions. These plans were presumably based on the best data, available to them, in the world: demand/supply figures, risk analysis, meteorological trends, alternatives, innovations, ecology. What did the economists predict? The Economist magazine with its international network of economic expertise said: ‘we may be heading for $5. … a normal price might now be in the range in the $5 - $10 range’

At the time of this March 1999 ‘oil glut,’ economist Prof. Paul Krugman recalled economists' prediction of long-term, stable prices ... just before the 1973 shock. ‘The rise and fall of oil prices was one of the most spectacular and puzzling events of history,' he wrote. 'As soon as oil was cheap again the subject was dropped’. He added that a ‘theory of markets that can’t explain the energy crisis {of the 1970s} is probably not much good for anything else.’ He warned of the next replay of that energy crisis.  A crisis does not just last months or a year but maybe, as in the past, a decade or more. It would devastate our economy. It would be the height of foolishness not to take preventive action where we can. 

C. Energy, pillage and hedging. When would the next energy problem strike the European economy? We didn't have long to wait. Suddenly within a just few short months of these 1999 predictions, oil more than tripled in price to over $30. Any consumer who suffered similar rip-offs, unilaterally tripling or quadrupling the price of  any other key resource in glut would be suspicious of market manipulation, global power/ hedging manoeuvring or political —foreign policy— intervention. While the impact was less traumatic than the price hike of earlier decades, the confiscation from the economy is still very costly. Adding $25 to every barrel of oil and gas equivalent dispossesses the EU of around $100 billion p.a. extra for exactly the same goods. It has massive knock-on effects on the growth of the whole economy. Who was behind it? The Economist reflected later, that a number of nation states, Norway, Mexico with Russia in the background forced up the price. Who knows? but if so, this Viking raid freely pillaged the purses of oil consumers around the world with no recourse to any democratic decisions at home or abroad. Nor apparently, to judge from their plans, were even oil companies given any warning of this hike. 

Is it true that even democratic states make a multi-billion grab at the citizen’s wealth with no democratic control? While the cartel of oil states, OPEC, continually complains at the supply-side indiscipline of its members, today the EU is paying more than double on spot and futures markets, now apparently firmly ratcheted upwards and far from the prediction of $5 a barrel long term. Is this a fitting way to manage the world economy of the twenty-first century? Is ‘price volatility’ just unauthorised, forced redistribution, leveraged ‘free (for some) trade’ or the slippery slope to a mega-disaster? 

The filing for bankruptcy of a dominant trader in the energy market, Enron, in November-December 2001, (called the largest US corporate collapse) has further disquieting aspects. Known for its ‘innovative use of financial theory and risk-management skills,’ Enron’s default has been paralleled with the calamitous, multi-billion dollar collapse of Long-Term Capital Management, a hedge fund that threatened the entire financial system. Are Europeans to remain bystanders while such global problems determine their fate? 

These are some indications of a volatile future ahead as Europe prepares to increase its vulnerability by nearly doubling its gas and oil imports in the next few decades. Europe needs to prepare a stabilised market for its most important imported resources NOW. We cannot afford the complacency of the past, or pay its additional costs. World terrorism centred on Middle Eastern countries and control of economic/political levers by oligarchs (Former Soviet Union) and profits-fixated ‘Big Business’ (many western countries) will offer no guarantee of stability, even less a fair deal for the consumer and the ecology of the planet. 

Without an international framework of ethics, law and democracy, the invisible hand of the market tends to become a mailed fist. Firstly, cartels, even of states, put a free market in chains. Cartels of companies are illegal in the USA and in the EU. The European Community created the world's first international control of cartels.  

Secondly, energy prices are also the subject of non-economic, foreign policies (the oil-producers were accumulating in the 1970s more wealth than they could cope with, while oil-induced inflation destroyed what they had). Besides being the object of policy, as in the past, Europeans are also involved indirectly. Wars and disasters in energy-producer states automatically affects Europeans' well-being.   

Thirdly, prices of our most precious raw materials are dangerously vulnerable to  anonymous, off-shore, financial leverage and speculation beyond the effective rule of law.  

Worse, the world market economy itself can be rapidly cut to ribbons by the hands of suicide bombers wielding cheap box knives.  This fourth danger, revealed openly by the events of 11 September, makes it clear that the profitable functioning of a global market is itself the TARGET of suicide fanatics-- the market and US power, not the multinational victims. The well-organized planning of global market destruction and self-destruction defy the very premises of economic logic (such as the materialist premise of personal economic benefit). Nonetheless, suicide for religio-political motives affects the market and will continue to threaten the market into the foreseeable future. A score of 'consumers' having bought a few dollars worth of box knives caused $100 billion worth of damage to New York.   Reuters reported the loss of value in one week on the New York Stock Exchange as $1.2 Trillion. (The US stock values plunged with a loss of $6.6 Trillion over the previous  18 months, in parallel with the sudden oil price hike. This sum, said Reuters, was equivalent to the combined economies of Japan, Germany and France.)  

An energy security policy must take 'non-economic' factors like suicide bombers into account. We have to reflect more wisely about our policies with a better understanding of the volition of our own human species. We are all interdependent in a global society. The politico-religious or ideological or even the visceral factor needs to be dealt with in the proven way that best assures long-term peace and mutual benefit. In economic terms we also need to come to grips with the past policies of greed: first the West exploiting other nations' resources and secondly the energy-exporting nations exploiting their political fulcrum on the West. 

As far as Europe’s increasing reliance on gas is concerned, it is unrealistic to assume there is ‘no danger’ (p47 of Green Paper). Cartels are only important when one smallish player cannot influence the other smaller players. If a major producer created a new profitable market leverage in gas, would Algeria, Turkmenistan or Norway object? Russia already has a dominant and growing position as importer. ‘Rigidity’ of a market is no guarantee against disruption for economic or non-economic reasons, rather the reverse. Price indexing does not allow any flexibility either, when an oil price hike occurs, as in 1979 or 1999. As for the ‘exemplary stability’ of the last 25 years market, one has only to turn to the exemplary, comparative stability of the oil market before and after the use of the oil weapon to see the need to reassess this argument. 

The use of a similar flawed premise is the major error behind the mathematical arguments used by Long-Term Capital Management and other hedging funds. Because one group considers the market incrementally stabilised (in the sense that it is not subject to discontinuities), their distorted model of human conduct offers a new, major market opportunity for others, quick to profit from their prognostic error. (An Achilles’ heel strategy). Discontinuities or defaults offer the unscrupulous mouth-watering temptations if there is no international rule of law. 

D. Political instabilities. Most of our imported energy comes from politically unstable areas. Must Europe, now one of the world’s most stable and peaceful areas, continue to be the victim of their instability? 

  • The alleged perpetrators of the events of 11 September, have implicitly blamed the Saudi government for the US occupation of its holy Arabian lands, ‘plunder of its wealth’ and as betrayer of their version of Islamic values. Disruption of Saudi oil would have major economic and political consequences for the entire region. The West's response of war and 'business as usual' will not resolve this problem
  • The present quasi-warfare between Israelis and Palestinians, following the virtual collapse of the peace process, is reverberating throughout the Middle East. The EU, providing funding without helping to create community institutions there, needs to reassess its own policy and responsibilities. 
  • Russia, Europe’s major gas importer, considered by IMF as one of the world’s most corrupt states, is instituting to a ‘dictatorship of law’ rather than the democratic application of it. How will its impoverished and exploited population, some still resentful at the loss of its superpower purpose, react in the future? The EU has a responsibility to give more realistic help to the post-Soviet transition and the unity of our continent. 
Western Europe was over centuries a war zone: making war, preparing for war and recovery from war. We need to share our new experience of peace through supranational law, initiated by Robert Schuman. Europe needs to expand its zone of peace, as Schuman said, in creating works of peace abroad. 

Can Europe export its model of democratic stability and community system, specifically to our importers in the energy field and transit countries including Ukraine, Belarus and Caspian states? That must be the basic philosophy behind any lasting European energy security policy. 

E. A stable basis for commerce. Increase in Europeans’ profligate energy use is not desirable. In the present situation, however, dependence on external sources is necessary. The EU has shown how all Europeans can benefit as a single market is opened. However, trade will only be secure if the basic ground rules of the EU – democracy, human rights, rule of law for business, anti-corruption measures – are safeguarded. The big policy question is how this secure environment for business strategy and planning—peace and the rule of law – can be extended to all of Europe (including Russia) and to the EU’s energy suppliers. History confirms that risk of disruption of trade is minimised in trade between democracies. A European energy destiny requires that energy trade become subject to civilised and civilising rules. 

F. Cost effectiveness of a policy. It is clear that over the last decades, the lack of stabilizing oil and gas prices and fair trade has probably cost trillions of dollars to the economy of the European Union. This energy non-policy may create economic losses greater than the gains we have seen through beneficial policies such as the single market. Any policy, even moderately successful, that could stabilize fair prices against speculation, pillage policies or unwarranted foreign policy intrusion, is likely to be of outstanding value to Europe’s citizens. This overview does not even consider the imperative of providing energy savings and an environment-friendly energy policy against global warming. A profligate energy policy can wreak untold damage on the environment and our children’s heritage. Whereas a wisely conceived energy-saving and ecology policy is a real jobs- and prosperity-creating instrument. 

 2. Does not Europe's increasingly integrated internal market, where decisions taken in one country have on an impact on the others, call for a consistent and co-ordinated policy at Community level?  

Answer: Yes and more extensively and technically than has been done so far. Interconnection of electrical grids, for example, leaves national grids vulnerable to unexpected transits and sudden peak loads. This has civil and defence implications. Disruption of pipelines or gas/oil deliveries for speculation or political purposes or in war is an increasing risk in monopsony or cartel trade, linked to futures market speculation. The best solution to these risks is a Community approach using the supranational method of the EU for a wider energy grouping to create an energy zone under the rule of supranational law. Two of the Community’s founding treaties directly involved the energy sector and the third did so implicitly. Further political innovation was foreseen for post-Soviet Europe in a declaration of supranational principles, ‘the true foundation for an organised Europe’ open to all countries behind the Iron Curtain. The declaration was the work of the EU founding fathers: Adenauer, Schuman, Sforza, Bech, van Zeeland and Stikker. For Schuman the supranational was the essential means to create a common European home. See www.schuman.info/fed 

 3. Are tax and state aid policies in the energy sector an obstacle to competitiveness in the European Union or not? Given the failure of attempts to harmonise indirect taxation, should not the whole issue of energy taxation be re-examined taking account of energy and environmental objectives?  

Answer: Member states apply a wide range of tax bites. It is not clear that tax measures have the greatest effect on consumption, energy saving, ecology and the public’s energy awareness. It may be more effective to develop ‘an energy culture’ where energy supply companies, energy conservation companies and environmentalists can forge common ground rules and mutual appreciation rather than working at cross purposes. This can best be done in a European Energy Community based on the supranational method. The experience of the European Coal and Steel Community showed that business, labour and the public can gain from such a framework. Businesses increased their trade through a new ability for creating viable, specialised products that were not possible without the Community.

 4. In the framework of an ongoing dialogue with producer countries, what should supply and investment promotion agreements contain? Given the importance of a partnership with Russia in particular, how can stable quantities, prices and investments be guaranteed?  

Answer: Russian gas supply is based on a monopoly/monopsony arrangement. History gives no confidence that such a trade is stable or desirable. The monopoly supplier, Gazprom, is now ostensibly run by the Russian government but it is a huge ‘state within a state’. Cutting Russian gas supplies and threats of cuts, not only for economic reasons but for foreign policy ones, have been regularly reported in the post-Soviet period. Even the EU is vulnerable if this should occur as gas is supplied to our most highly sensitive areas. In our interdependent world, a community of interests must be established were strategic energy trade is guaranteed by the rule of law in a democratic energy community, based on equality. This needs to be founded on a treaty and include democratic institutions and decision-making based on proven, just and fair principles of the European Community, not threats. 

 5. Should more reserves be stockpiled – as already done for oil - and should other energy sources be included, such as gas or coal? Should the Community take on a greater role in stock management and, if so, what should the objectives and modalities be? Does the risk of physical disruption to energy supplies justify more onerous measures for access to resources?  

Answer: Stockpiling for adverse meteorological conditions is prudence. Stockpiling for political risk management is an admission that an energy security policy is based on the wrong principles. Stockpiling is expensive (costing the US, for example, billions of dollars) and symbolises distrust; in contrast, a Community approach actually generates wealth. It cuts costs and is beneficial in many ways as it creates an expanding zone of confidence and prosperity. A Community approach pump-primes an unstoppable demand for the rule of law, democracy and justice in other sectors of the member states’ economy. 

Will we let the European economy continue to bleed trillions because of an energy non-policy? What is lacking so far is vision, political courage and a strategy of step-by-step implementation.

 6. How can we develop and ensure better operation of energy transport networks in the European Union and neighbouring countries so as to enable the internal market to function properly and guarantee security of supply?  

Answer: The book, Russia and the danger for the European Union, describes how the economics of an Energy Community can create investment funds for both major infrastructure networks and also local initiatives. It describes how a Community can not only encourage energy networks but complementary financial networks and democratic networks which can work together to ensure success.

 7.  The development of some renewable energy sources calls for major efforts in terms of research and technological development, investment aid and operational aid. Should co-financing of this aid include a contribution from sectors which received substantial initial development aid and which are now highly profitable (gas, oil, nuclear)?  

Answer: This is discussed in the book, Russia and the danger for the European Union. Briefly, energy-saving funds and a small Community tax on production can be used to encourage new energy sources and energy experiments. The new EU member states from central and eastern Europe would be in an especially favourable position to benefit from this and boost their economies.

 8. Seeing that nuclear energy is one of the elements in the debate on tackling climate change and energy autonomy, how can the Community find a solution to the problem of nuclear waste, reinforcing nuclear safety and developing research into reactors of the future, in particular fusion technology ?  

Answer: All energy technologies have a substantial impact on the environment. Nuclear energy has aroused fierce opposition because the sector arose out of services governed by military secrecy and then subject to a false PR campaign to sell nuclear electricity. This was not conducive to a stable, long-term market. Openness is needed. The new generation of reactors, being developed in the USA, has much better safety features. But only an open debate, minutely examining all the issues will now convince the public that nuclear is a feasible alternative and a help in the climate change debate. The potential of the Euratom Treaty has largely remained undeveloped and ossified. An Energy Community would have public debate institutions, such as a Parliament where both public and pressure groups can investigate specific common measures (laws, regulations and directives). They would be forced to come up with common positions (opinions) on such measures and stimulate an impartial debate of the facts. There are many aspects of fusion reactors that need a real public airing. 

 9. Which policies should permit the European Union to fulfil its obligations under the Kyoto Protocol? What measures could be taken in order to exploit fully potential energy savings which would help to reduce both our external dependence and CO2 emissions?  

Answer: These are the types of issues that can best be decided by a much broader debate in an Energy Community Assembly or Parliament, rather than by a few hundred companies or pressure groups that are replying to this questionnaire. EU governments have the duty and responsibility to provide such a structure for deep investigation of these matters. They concern the life and death of the planet and the well-being of all European citizens. The present European Parliament and the Economic and Social Committee etc have their own function to play but in an Energy Community, both supplier country representatives and EU representatives should work on the basis of equality to find mutually acceptable solutions – as inherent in a community of common interest.

 10. Can an ambitious programme to promote biofuels and other substitute fuels, including hydrogen, geared to 20% of total fuel consumption by 2020, continue to be implemented via national initiatives, or are co-ordinated decisions required on taxation, distribution and prospects for agricultural production ?  

Answer: The petroleum sector has had over a century to establish its worldwide services, geopolitical infrastructures and markets. But now some oil companies say they are preparing for an alternative future. The EU should encourage them and also smaller entrepreneurs whose energy sources or fuels have been subject to discrimination in the past. How can this be done without disrupting present markets? It can best be discussed in an Energy Forum or Parliament and decided together in an Energy Community. 

 11. Should energy saving in buildings (40% of energy consumption), whether public or private, new or under renovation, be promoted through incentives such as tax breaks, or are regulatory measures required along the lines of those adopted for major industrial installations?  

Answer: The energy saving paradox is that the poor cannot afford (or think they cannot afford) energy-saving measures and the rich don’t care. Those in the middle are often too busy or distracted by other activities. Energy efficiency possibilities in public buildings are too often curtailed by limited funds, and public spending and accountancy systems. A change in culture is required before changes can be made in mentalities and existing systems. All new houses could be to high efficient, energy-saving standards and all existing houses could be upgraded but this needs something equivalent to creating a sense of planetary duty. Huge savings can be made simply with a new generation of lighting, for example. The existence of a new Energy Community of geopolitical stature would help impress citizens with the urgency of the problems.

 12. Energy saving in the transport sector (32% of energy consumption) depends on redressing the growing imbalance between road and rail. Is this imbalance inevitable, or could corrective action be taken, however unpopular, notably to encourage lower use of cars in urban areas? How can the aims of opening up the sector to competition, investment in infrastructure to remove bottlenecks and intermodality be reconciled?  

Answer: Two thousand years ago the Celts and the Romans built cross-country aqueducts that provided the means to let water flow gradually from one part of a region to another. Today it is difficult to find a public transport system where the passenger does not have to walk up and down multiple staircases (with luggage) and find a way through the complex system that ‘connects’ one mode of transport (rail, bus, underground, air) with another. Do modern planners and engineers assume all travellers are young, fit and without baggage? Goods in bar-coded ship/rail/lorry containers should be able to pass easily from one part of the Community to another. A car is a container that delivers passengers from home to work (with the additional problems of parking and congestion). Unless public transport can begin to compete in comfort and seamless transition in the same way, energy will continue to be burned expensively in cars. The non-car sector needs the streamlining equivalent of the motorways of the 1930s. We have new information technologies to help structural change. 

 13. How can we develop more collaborative visions and integrate the long-term dimension into deliberations and actions undertaken by public authorities and other involved parties in order to evolve a sustainable system of energy supply. How are we to prepare the energy options for the future?  

Answer: The debate at the moment is fragmented. The various elements of a European vision need to be analysed together: energy supply, use, conservation, environment, transport, impact on other sectors, social policy and so on. Too often these are uncoordinated. An Energy Community would at least provide the means to integrate these diverse interests on a continental scale. Human experience is as great as all the individuals in the population concerned. We are all walking encyclopaedias of experience. We need to find ways of bringing this experience together and not simply take the easy route of speaking to a few organisations or companies that think they have the solution.

 14. Any other questions or proposals:  

The books referred to in my answers also propose a timetable of staged innovation for the Energy Community structures. This is related to the adhesion of new member states to the EC and EU. The fifty-year termination of the European Coal and Steel Community Treaty in summer next year also provides a major marker and opportunity. 

 (c) Bron December 2001