EU Policies & Recommendations

About

This chapter presents key European Union policies and strategic recommendations that shape the development and governance of data spaces across sectors. Understanding the policy landscape is essential for ensuring that the project’s outcomes align with current legal and ethical frameworks, support interoperability and trust, and contribute to Europe's vision of a single market for data. This context lays the groundwork for designing a data toolbox that is compliant, scalable, and impactful within the EU ecosystem.

Affordable Energy Action Plan

As part of the Clean Industrial Deal, the European Commission presented on 26 February 2025 an Affordable Energy Action Plan [2] (COM/2025/79), which is based on 4 pillars:

1. lowering energy costs for all

2. completing the Energy Union

3. attracting investments and ensuring delivery

4. being ready for potential energy crises

The Action Plan includes the following 8 actions, many of which will be delivered already in 2025:

• Action 1 – Making electricity bills more affordable: The Commission will put forward a methodology to ensure that network charges incentivise the most efficient use of the grid, lowering energy system costs and total new grid investment needs, and will make recommendations to EU countries to lower national taxes on electricity, immediately reducing energy bills.

• Action 2 – Bring down the cost of electricity supply: Costs can be better controlled by swiftly and fully applying existing EU electricity rules, and additional actions to promote the uptake of long-term electricity supply contracts, accelerate permitting procedures for key energy projects, reinforce grids and boost flexibility.

• Action 3 – Ensure well-functioning gas markets: The Commission will explore how to harness the Union’s purchasing power to get a better deal for imported natural gas.

• Action 4 – Energy efficiency & delivering energy savings: Energy efficiency helps avoid high energy bills. The Commission will support market actors who provide energy efficiency solutions for businesses through the European Energy Efficiency Financing Coalition and update its rules on energy labelling and eco design for products.

• Action 5 – Complete the Energy Union: To enhance coordination and strengthen governance of the electricity system, the completion of a genuine Energy Union, including a fully integrated energy market and a cohesive governance framework, is key to preventing sharp increases of system costs of up to €103 billion by 2040 if no action is taken.

• Action 6 – A tripartite contract to ensure affordable energy for Europe’s industry: To counteract high energy prices and market uncertainty, a broader tripartite contract for affordable energy can bring together the public sector, energy producers, and energy-consuming industries to create a favourable investment climate, facilitating a competitive EU industrial sector, while ensuring the retention and creation of quality jobs.

• Action 7 – Guarantee security of supply for price stability: Ensuring secure EU energy supplies is critical for our economic resilience, continued access to affordable energy and avoiding extreme price volatility. A resilient energy system must be able to withstand potential supply disruptions resulting from geopolitical tensions, cyberattacks, deliberate attacks or extreme weather events, which threaten affordability.

• Action 8 – Price crisis preparedness: The Commission will guide EU countries on the application of measures that incentivise consumers to reduce demand at certain times and will work with transmission system operators and national regulatory authorities to temporarily increase electricity flows in cross-border interconnectors, in certain situations.

The action plan's implementation will enable the EU to save €130 billion on fossil fuel imports per year by 2030, representing an estimated 0.65% of the GDP by 2030. Savings will increase annually up to €260 billion by 2040.

Clean Industrial Deal

The EU's Clean Industrial Deal [3], unveiled on February 26, 2025, is a comprehensive plan to decarbonize, reindustrialize, and boost the competitiveness of European industry. It focuses on accelerating decarbonization while securing the future of manufacturing in Europe and aims to establish the EU as a global leader in the circular economy. The deal emphasizes energy-intensive industries and clean tech sectors, promoting circularity, reducing dependencies on external suppliers, and fostering innovation. The main elements of the Clean Industrial Deal are the following:

• Affordable energy: Affordable energy is the foundation of competitiveness. To lower energy bills for industries, businesses and households, while promoting the transition to a low-carbon economy, the Commission adopted the affordable energy action plan to: speed up the roll-out of clean energy, accelerating electrification; complete the internal energy market with physical interconnections; use energy more efficiently and cut dependence on imported fossil fuels.

• Boosting demand for clean products: The industrial decarbonisation accelerator act will increase demand for EU-made clean products, by introducing sustainability, resilience, and 'made in Europe' criteria in public and private procurements. The Commission will also review the public procurement framework in 2026 to introduce sustainability, resilience and European preference criteria in public procurement for strategic sectors.

• Financing the clean transition: The Clean Industrial Deal will mobilise over €100 billion to support EU-made clean manufacturing. The Commission will: adopt a new Clean Industrial Deal state aid framework to accelerate the approval of state aid to roll out renewable energy, decarbonise industry and ensure sufficient manufacturing capacity of clean tech; strengthen the Innovation Fund and propose an industrial decarbonisation bank, aiming for €100 billion in funding, based on available funds in the Innovation Fund, additional revenues resulting from parts of the ETS as well as the revision of InvestEU; launch a dedicated call under Horizon Europe to stimulate research and innovation in these areas; amend the InvestEU Regulation to increase the amount of financial guarantees that InvestEU can provide to support investments. This will in turn mobilise up to €50 billion for the deployment of clean tech, clean mobility and waste reduction.

• Circularity and access to materials: Critical raw materials are key for our industry. The EU needs to secure access to such materials and reduce dependence on unreliable suppliers. Integrating circularity in our decarbonisation strategy is crucial to making the most of the EU’s limited resources. The Commission will: set up a mechanism enabling European companies to come together and aggregate their demand for critical raw materials; create an EU critical raw material centre to jointly purchase raw materials on behalf of interested companies which will create economies of scale and offer more leverage to negotiate better prices and conditions; adopt a circular economy act in 2026 to accelerate the circular transition and ensure that scarce materials are used and reused efficiently, reduce our global dependencies and create high-quality jobs. The aim is to have 24% of materials circular by 2030.

• Acting on a global scale: The EU needs reliable global partners more than ever. In addition to ongoing and new trade agreements, the Commission will: launch the first Clean Trade and Investment Partnerships to diversify supply chains and forge mutually beneficial deals; ensure the EU industry is economically secure and resilient, in the face of global competition and geopolitical uncertainties, through a range of trade defence and other instruments; simplify and strengthen the carbon border adjustment mechanism, the EU's tool to put a fair price on the carbon emitted during the production of carbon intensive goods.

• Skills and quality jobs: The EU's workforce must have the necessary skills to support the transition to a low-carbon economy, including skills in clean technologies, digitalisation, and entrepreneurship. The Commission will establish a union of skills that invests in workers, develops skills and creates quality jobs. Erasmus+ will reinforce education and training programmes to develop a skilled and adaptable workforce, and address skills shortages in key sectors, with up to €90 million in funding. The Clean Industrial Deal will also focus on horizontal enablers necessary for a competitive economy: cutting red tape; fully exploiting the scale of the single market; promoting quality jobs; better coordinating policies at the EU and national levels.

CRA (Cyber Resilience Act)

The Cyber Resilience Act [4] entered into force last year, in 2024. It is the following regulation to the NIS 2 directive and the Cybersecurity Act (2019). The CRA is the legal framework for hardware and software products with digital elements in the EU market. It introduces security through the product life cycle. It introduces cybersecurity requirements to manufacturers and retailers.

The goal of the CRA is to address the inadequate level of cybersecurity in many products by requiring manufacturers and retailers to introduce cybersecurity by design in the life cycle of the product. The only products excluded from the CRA are the ones that already have specific regulations and certifications, such as medical devices.

The main obligations introduced by the Act will apply from 11 December 2027 as part of the EU Cybersecurity Strategy.

Relevance to CELINE

Most of the obligations will apply by the end of the project, but a first analysis should be made in order to be aware of the requirements that CELINE may need to be compliant with the CRA. The different digital elements used in CELINE should be considered for CRA review.

Digital Markets Act

The Digital Markets Act [5], effective from May 2, 2023, is a landmark regulation that establishes a set of clearly defined objective criteria to qualify a large online platform as a “gatekeeper” and ensures that they behave fairly online and leave room for contestability. The Digital Markets Act is one of the centrepieces of the European digital strategy. Its primary objective is to ensure a fair and open digital market, enhancing consumer choice and fostering innovation. The DMA establishes a set of rules targeting major online platforms that hold significant market power. These platforms, termed gatekeepers, are subject to specific obligations and prohibitions to prevent them from abusing their dominant positions.

What are gatekeepers?

Gatekeepers are large digital platforms providing any of a pre-defined set of digital services (‘core platform services’), such as online search engines, app stores, and messenger services. These companies have:

• a strong economic position, significant impact on the internal market and are active in multiple EU countries

• a strong intermediation position, meaning that they link a large user base to a large number of businesses

• an entrenched and durable position in the market, meaning that their position has been stable over time

On 6 September 2023, the European Commission designated for the first time six gatekeepers - Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft. In total, 22 core platform services provided by those gatekeepers have been designated.

Key Rules for Gatekeepers

Gatekeepers are prohibited from:

• self-preferencing their services over those of competitors

• bundling their own apps or services in a way that disadvantages third-party providers

• reusing personal data collected from one service to target users on another without explicit consent

• restricting business users from offering their services on other platforms

• limiting users' ability to uninstall pre-installed apps or to install apps from third-party sources

• imposing unfair conditions on business users, such as mandatory use of their payment systems

Conversely, gatekeepers are required to:

• ensure interoperability of core services, such as enabling messaging across different platforms

• provide transparency regarding advertising and marketing data to business users

• allow users to easily unsubscribe from services

• notify the European Commission of significant mergers or acquisitions

Digitalisation of Energy Action Plan

The Digitalisation of Energy Action Plan [6] initiative was launched in 2022; this action plan promotes the digital transformation of the energy system. It focuses on the need for a system-wide approach, fostering cooperation between digital and energy stakeholders to enhance efficiency, cybersecurity, and customer empowerment.

Relevance to CELINE

The CELINE project, through the implementation of a Digital Toolbox designed to analyse and optimize energy consumption, directly contributes to the goals of the Digital Energy Action Plan.

Firstly, it empowers citizens as end users to become active participants in the energy system, shifting from passive consumers to informed prosumers. Moreover, CELINE fosters the interoperability of cross-sectoral data, including energy, mobility, and environmental data, by relying on ontology-based tools that structure and exploit this information. This approach supports the development of an open, interoperable, and intelligent energy data management system, as mentioned within the Digital Energy action plan.

Finally, by testing its solutions across multiple European countries (Spain, Finland, and Italy), CELINE contributes to the development of scalable and transferable local energy initiatives, aligning with the EU’s vision for a connected and citizen-driven energy future.

Energy Efficiency Directive

The EU Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) [7]-[8] is a central part of the European Union’s climate and energy policy, aimed at promoting energy savings across all sectors to help meet the EU’s climate goals, particularly under the European Green Deal and the Fit for 55 package.

The revised Energy Efficiency Directive (EU/2023/1791) significantly raises the EU’s ambition on energy efficiency. It establishes ‘energy efficiency first’ as a fundamental principle of EU energy policy, giving it legal standing for the first time. In practical terms, this means that energy efficiency must be considered by EU countries in all relevant policy and major investment decisions taken in the energy and non-energy sectors. The 2023 revision of the directive follows a proposal for a recast directive on energy efficiency put forward by the Commission in July 2021, as part of the EU Green Deal package. The 2021 proposal was further enhanced as part of the REPowerEU plan, presented by the Commission in May 2022, aiming to decrease the EU’s dependency on fossil fuel imports from Russia. Full implementation of the Energy Efficiency Directive will be key for the EU to comply with the commitment of the Global Pledge to double the global rate of energy efficiency improvements from about 2% to over 4% by 2030.

The revised EED is based upon the following milestones:

• EU-wide binding energy efficiency target: Reduce final energy consumption by 11.7% by 2030, compared to projected 2030 levels (from 2020 modelling).

• Annual energy savings obligation: Member States must deliver an average of 1.49% annual energy savings from 2024 to 2030 (up from 0.8%).

• Annual energy savings obligation (in end-use sectors, such as buildings, industry and transport): Member States must deliver cumulative end-use energy savings for the entire obligation period (running from 2021 to 2030), equivalent to new annual savings of at least 0.8% of final energy consumption in 2021-2023, at least 1.3% in 2024-2025, 1.5% in 2026-2027 and 1.9% in 2028-2030.

• Public sector leadership: Public bodies must renovate at least 3% of the total floor area of buildings they own each year. Energy management systems must be implemented in large public entities. New public procurement must favour energy-efficient products and services.

• Energy poverty and vulnerable consumers: Member States must prioritize energy efficiency improvements for vulnerable households. A portion of energy savings must come from addressing energy poverty.

• Energy audits and management systems: Mandatory for large enterprises. Encouraged for SMEs via incentives.

Energy Poverty Directive

The reform of the electricity market (Directive (EU) 2024/1711, published in June 2024) strengthens the rights and protection of consumers. Among other measures, they ensure clearer information and improved rights, especially for the most vulnerable and those affected by energy poverty. Member States shall take appropriate and non-discriminatory measures to ensure that vulnerable customers and customers affected by energy poverty can access energy sharing schemes. Those measures may include financial support measures or production allocation quotas.

The revised Energy Efficiency Directive [95] (EU/2023/1791), adopted and published in September 2023, puts a stronger focus on alleviating energy poverty and empowering consumers through a range of far-reaching measures. The revised Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EU/2024/1275), which entered into force in May 2024, also includes specific provisions relating to households in energy poverty, vulnerable households, and people living in social housing. This Directive requires, among other measures, EU countries to include specific plans to reduce the number of people affected by energy poverty in their National Building Renovation Plans. Furthermore, related policies and measures, including actions related to information, should be aimed at alleviating energy poverty.

In 2021, in this increasingly targeting energy poverty in the EU policy action, aiming to boost efforts towards the effective reduction of this issue within a framework of energy efficiency, decarbonisation of the economy, and a clean and just energy transition. The EU package “Fit for 55” included specific measures to identify key drivers of energy poverty risks for consumers, considering structural solutions to underlying vulnerabilities and inequalities.

The Clean Energy for All Europeans package (adopted by the EU in 2019) introduced explicit obligations to identify, monitor and tackle energy poverty through National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs). In 2020, the Commission published a first Recommendation on energy poverty (EU/2020/1563) and in 2023 a second Recommendation (C/2023/4080) which have become reference documents. Following these indications for their NECPs, several Member States have developed national strategies to tackle energy poverty, advancing their own definition, methods for measurement and monitoring, and solutions to tackle it in terms of a national point of view. The adequate measuring and monitoring of energy poverty enables a more comprehensive understanding of the breadth and depth of the problem, which is an essential step towards the production of effective evidence-based policy strategies and schemes, as well as the impact assessment of these instruments for a faster resolution of the problem. The National energy poverty strategies rely primarily on indicators from EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU SILC) to more directly evaluate and monitor energy poverty levels in the country. These indicators have some advantages regarding data collection, monitoring, and commensurability and are generally preferred by the EU, but they do not constitute a comprehensive approach to the problem and are not explicitly collected for energy poverty evaluation. They do not capture the full extent of the problem, particularly the different facets that make up vulnerability to energy poverty. Furthermore, these indicators are primarily collected at the national level, from a uniform European framework aiming to produce comparable data between Member States, thus not capturing local realities and contexts within countries. Subsequently, they do not enable more nuanced approaches regarding the spatial scale and diversity of determinants. Researchers support multidimensional composite metrics to capture all the dimensions of energy poverty in one metric. Still, these are difficult to transfer to other contexts without undermining transparency and effectiveness. Therefore, selecting indicators is paramount for correctly identifying populations suffering from energy poverty. This process must consider context, scale, and data availability [94]-[102].

Relevance to CELINE

Energy poverty requires holistic efforts at all levels of governance, from the European to the local level. While national-level evaluations are essential to get the dimension of the problem, setting the scene and framing other analyses and measures, regional and local assessments can provide more detailed and insightful perspectives, enabling the unpacking of vulnerability situations that are particular to specific contexts and groups. The identification of households at risk of energy poverty at an early stage can be more accurate and practical at the level of towns, cities, and regions. To monitor the progress of its alleviation, there is a need to connect and align the commitments made at the national level with the energy poverty configurations and population needs at the regional and local levels to monitor progress in energy poverty alleviation. Local authorities play an essential role in detecting energy poverty in their jurisdictions. They may have more detailed data and information on the population, and closer links, together with the social and civil organisations.

EU AI Act

The EU AI Act [10] (Regulation 2024/1689) sets out harmonized rules to regulate artificial intelligence (AI) across the European Union. It aims to ensure that AI technologies are safe, transparent, and trustworthy, while fostering innovation in a way that aligns with European values, ethics, and fundamental rights. The Act introduces a risk-based classification system for AI systems, which categorizes AI applications into four levels of risk: minimal, limited, high, and unacceptable. For high-risk AI applications, including those in critical sectors like energy, stringent requirements are imposed, such as transparency, accountability, and human oversight.

Relevance to CELINE

For CELINE, the EU AI Act is especially relevant as it addresses the development and deployment of AI tools in community-based energy systems, such as those proposed in the project’s Digital Twin of community energy systems and AI Assistant Tools. CELINE’s approach to AI must comply with the Act's guidelines, ensuring that AI-driven tools, like those facilitating energy optimization and self-consumption schemes, are developed and tested with a high degree of safety, ethical consideration, and user control. The Act supports CELINE’s goals of fostering trust and promoting the digital transformation of the energy sector, while also ensuring the sovereignty of users' data and aligning with broader EU regulations on AI and data governance.

EU Data Governance Act

The Data Governance Act [11] is a regulation that entered into force in 2022 as an important action in the European Data Strategy. The Data Governance Act regulates the processes and structures that facilitate voluntary data sharing:

• increasing trust in data sharing

• increasing data availability mechanisms

• overcome technical obstacles to data reuse

• enhance the Common European Data Spaces

Relevance to CELINE

As a part of the European Data Strategy, the regulation will be analysed within D2.4, and the main aspects will affect the data sharing exchanges and flux.

EU Data Strategy

The European Commission has traced an EU Data Strategy [21], which is reflected in different legislations such as the Data Act, Data Governance Act, and Digital Service Act. The new legislation aims to facilitate data sharing across sectors and member states to create business, but also provide trustworthiness and control to citizens over their data.

The goal is to improve a single data market across member states, enhance a common and interoperable dataspace in main domains such as Energy, Health, and provide citizen tools to control their data. Another important point is the data re-use, establishing clear and beneficial rules for that, too.

Several problems are still there that brake the data economy such as: fragmentation in EU members which affects directly in the vision of a common strategy and digital data market; availability of the data, the value of data and its reuse is high and there is not enough data available for innovative and research purposes; public sector and data sharing within public sector is an important factor to prevent any risk; Data interoperability and quality; data governance; empower individuals to exercise their rights due to lack of tools and standards to exercise correctly their rights, cybersecurity.

European data strategy serves to realise the vision for a genuine single market for data and tackles the problems identified through policy measures and funding, building on what has already been achieved in the last few years.

The actions are based on 4 pillars:

1. A cross-sectoral governance framework for data access and use

   • Propose a legislative framework for the governance of common European data spaces, Q4 2020.

   • Adopt an implementing act on high-value datasets, Q1 2021.

   • Propose, as appropriate, a Data Act, 2021

   • Analysis of the importance of data in the digital economy (e.g. through the Observatory of the Online Platform Economy), and review of the existing policy framework in the context of the Digital Services Act package (Q4 2020).

2. Enablers: Investments in data and strengthening Europe’s capabilities and infrastructures for hosting, processing, and using data, interoperability

   • Invest in a high-impact project on European data spaces, encompassing data sharing architectures (including standards for data sharing, best practices, tools) and governance mechanisms, as well as the European federation of energy-efficient and trustworthy cloud infrastructures and related services.

   • Sign Memoranda of Understanding with Member States on cloud federation, Q3 2020

   • Launch a European cloud services marketplace, integrating the full stack of cloud service offerings, Q4 2022.

   • Create an EU (self-)regulatory cloud rulebook, Q2 2022.

3. Competences: Empowering individuals, investing in skills, and SMEs

   • explore enhancing the portability right for individuals under Article 20 of the GDPR, giving them more control over who can access and use machine-generated data (possibly as part of the Data Act in 2021).

4. Common European data spaces in strategic sectors and domains of public interest. The Commission supports the establishment of the following nine common European data spaces:

   • A Common European industrial (manufacturing) data space

   • A Common European Green Deal data space

   • A Common European mobility data space

   • A Common European health data space

   • A Common European financial data space

   • A Common European energy data space

   • A Common European agriculture data space

   • Common European data spaces for public administration

   • A Common European skills data space

Relevance to CELINE

The CELINE project is collecting, sharing, and accessing data from each demo site through the platform, providing services. The data strategy affects the whole project, and it is needed to be aware and aligned with the regulations and strategies to accomplish the project.

EU Electricity Market Design

The EU Electricity Market Design [9] reforms the electricity markets, turning them into an incentive for the clean energy transition and delivering energy security by giving consumers more control over their consumption and choosing energy suppliers. The design of the electricity market encompasses the difficulties in EU legislation into national transpositions, the share of electricity produced by renewable energy sources (mostly solar and wind) up to 60% by 2030, while maintaining the electricity production when there is no wind or sun, among others.

The need to adapt to better integrate renewable energies and attract investment in fossil-free flexible technologies that can complement variable energy production, such as demand side response and energy storage, is a fact. It is needed to provide incentives for consumers to become more active and contribute to maintaining the electricity system stable. The EU Electricity market needs transparency and efficiency in monitoring the system. In the last years, the volatile energy prices and serious concerns about the security of supply have pushed the EU Governments and the Commission to work on the structural reform of the electricity market to help Europe secure its energy sovereignty and achieve climate neutrality. For this new design of the electricity market:

• A reform is proposed within the Green Deal Industrial Plan (2023)

• New rules entered into force in July 2024

The main objectives of these new rules are to make an EU energy market more resilient and the energy bills of European consumers and companies more independent from the short-term market price of electricity (using long-term contracts); accelerate the deployment and integration of more renewable energy sources in the energy system and enhance protection against market manipulation by promoting stability and predictability of energy prices (new role of ACER – Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators).

The new rules affect the following list:

• Electricity Directive and Electricity Regulation

• The ACER Regulation

• REMIT Regulation

• Revised Renewable Energy Directive

European Electricity Directive (EMD)

The European Electricity Directive (EMD) [14], under Directive 2019/944, is a key piece of legislation designed to facilitate the integration of Renewable Energy Communities (RECs) into the broader European electricity market. One of its main objectives is to clarify and strengthen these communities' rights, particularly concerning energy sharing among their members or shareholders. The directive promotes local energy autonomy and self-sufficiency. This approach not only empowers consumers but also supports the EU’s overarching goal of transitioning towards cleaner and more sustainable energy systems.

The EMD also addresses the integration of RECs into the competitive electricity market, ensuring they have fair access to the electricity grid and can operate on an equal footing with traditional energy producers and providers. This integration is crucial in ensuring that RECs are able to participate actively in the energy market without facing discrimination or barriers. This level playing field enables energy communities to contribute to and benefit from the energy transition, aligning with broader EU policies such as the European Green Deal.

Relevance to CELINE

CELINE’s vision of empowering communities through localized energy solutions, such as self-consumption and energy-sharing schemes, directly aligns with the rights and mechanisms outlined in the EMD. The directive enables the tools and services developed by CELINE, like the Digital Twin of community energy systems and the AI Assistant Tools, to function within a legal and regulatory framework that ensures fair and transparent energy sharing. By providing support for decentralized and community-driven energy systems, CELINE contributes to the realization of the EMD’s objectives, fostering decentralized energy production and consumption in a manner that is consistent with EU policy goals.

Additionally, CELINE’s focus on data sovereignty, interoperability, and the integration of cross-sector data aligns well with the EMD’s drive to promote inclusivity and transparency in the energy market. The ability to share and manage energy data securely and transparently across diverse energy stakeholders is central to ensuring that RECs can effectively participate in the energy market and make informed decisions based on real-time data insights.

EMD provides the regulatory foundation that supports CELINE’s goal of creating innovative, community-based, and digital-driven energy solutions, while also helping the project ensure that its tools and services are in line with EU regulations.

European Green Deal and REPower EU plan

The European Green Deal [15] is the EU’s strategy to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, focusing on clean energy, sustainable industry, and green mobility. The REPowerEU Plan is the EU’s 2022 initiative to phase out Russian fossil fuels by accelerating renewables, energy savings, and hydrogen deployment.

Relevance to CELINE

The European Green Deal and REPowerEU directly influence CELINE’s mission in three key ways:

1. Boosting Energy Communities: The Green Deal’s Renewable Energy Directive (RED II/III) supports energy sharing and citizen-led renewables, which CELINE facilitates through its digital platform. REPowerEU’s €300B investment prioritizes local energy projects, creating funding opportunities for CELINE’s community-focused solutions.

2. Driving Digital Energy Innovation: The Green Deal’s Digitalization Strategy promotes smart grids and AI-driven optimization, aligning with CELINE’s toolbox for real-time energy management. REPowerEU accelerates P2P energy trading and virtual power plants, which CELINE can integrate into its platform.

3. Enabling Policy & Funding Support: The Green Deal and REpowerEU provide the regulatory framework prioritising renewable energy deployment, decarbonisation, and energy system integration – aligned with CELINE’s objectives, as well as unlock funding through instruments like the Recovery and Resilience Facility.

Fit for 55

The EU Fit for 55 [17] package is a comprehensive set of policy proposals introduced by the European Commission in July 2021. Its goal is to help the European Union reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% by 2030 compared to 1990 levels, in line with the European Green Deal and the EU’s 2050 climate neutrality target.

The package ensures a just and socially fair transition; maintains and strengthens innovation and competitiveness of EU industry while ensuring a level playing field vis-à-vis third country economic operators; underpins the EU's position as leading the way in the global fight against climate change.

The Key Objectives of the Package are:

• 55% Emission Reduction by 2030: Achieve a 55% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 1990 levels.

• Climate Neutrality by 2050: Set a legally binding target for the EU to become climate-neutral by 2050.

• Social Fairness: Ensure a just transition by protecting vulnerable households and regions through financial support mechanisms.

The Core Legislative Measures of Fit of 55 are:

• Revised EU Emissions Trading System (ETS):

  1. Expansion: Inclusion of maritime transport and a separate ETS for buildings and road transport (ETS2) starting in 2027.

  2. Tightened Targets: Increase in the annual rate of emission reductions from 2.2% to 4.2%.

  3. Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM): Introduction of a carbon price on imports of high-carbon goods to prevent carbon leakage.

• Renewable Energy Directive (RED III):

  1. Increased Targets: Raise the EU-wide renewable energy target to 40% by 2030.

  2. Sectoral Sub-targets: Set specific targets for renewable energy in transport, heating and cooling, and industry.

• Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR): Allocate binding emission reduction targets to each Member State for sectors not covered by the ETS, such as transport, buildings, and agriculture.

• Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry (LULUCF) Regulation: Aim to increase the EU's natural carbon sink to 310 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent by 2030.

• Energy Taxation Directive: Align energy taxation with climate and energy policies, promoting cleaner technologies and removing outdated exemptions.

• Social Climate Fund: Establish a fund to support vulnerable households and micro-enterprises in financing energy efficiency improvements and cleaner mobility options.

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) [18] is the regulation that unifies through the European Union data protection and users’ rights. It entered into force in May 2018. The GDPR provides new rights for users, emphasizes lawfulness, legitimacy, purpose of the data processing, and introduces new roles in the Data Protection and Privacy domain, which allows new business possibilities and markets.

GDPR introduces 7 guiding principles:

1. lawfulness, fairness, and transparency.

2. purpose limitation

3. data minimisation

4. accuracy

5. storage limitation

6. integrity and confidentiality

7. accountability

New rights for the individuals:

• right to erasure (to be forgotten)

• right to data portability (change of provider includes the data from one to another by the provider)

• right to be informed (together with transparency)

• right to access

New roles:

• DPO (Data Protection Officer): It is a completely new role whose goal is to ensure that an organization processes the personal and/or sensitive data in compliance with the applicable data protection rules. Organisations with more than 250 employees must nominate a DPO. The DPO advises the organisation and ensures that controllers and data subjects are informed about their data protection rights, obligations. He gives recommendations about the interpretation of the law. He must create a data registry with the processing of data, handle the complaints and cooperate with the DPAs and EDPS (European Data Protection Supervisor).

• DPA (Data Protection Authority): The data protection authority is independent public authorities that supervise, through investigative and corrective powers, the application of the data protection law. They provide expert advice on data protection issues and handle complaints lodged against violations of the General Data Protection Regulation and the relevant national laws. There is one in each EU Member State.

• Data Controller: determines the purposes and means for processing personally identifiable information (PII – personal data) other than natural persons who use data for personal purposes.

• Data Processor: processes personally identifiable information (PII – personal data) on behalf of and following the instructions of a data controller.

Relevance to CELINE

GDPR applies to all data collection from users, personal or sensitive data, the processing applied to their data, and their rights. But also, to the different roles of data within the project, such as the data controllers, data processors, and which relationship between them is necessary (agreements or not). There is something that will be studied through the project.

Revised Renewable Energy Directive (RED II)

The Revised Renewable Energy Directive (RED II) [19] (Directive (EU) 2023/2413), an amendment to the original Renewable Energy Directive (EU 2018/2001), entered into force on 18 October  2023. It builds upon the ground laid back on 11 December 2018 to carve out a tougher, more coherent EU-wide framework for rolling out renewables, boosting efficiency, and knitting national grids closer together. At its core is a push to slash red tape: project developers will find a much leaner permitting regime under Article 6.2, shaving months or even years off the time it takes to get wind farms, solar parks, or biogas plants online. This latest revision doesn’t stop at speeding approvals. Article 4.1 enshrines fresh, higher targets for deploying wind, solar, biomass, and other renewables right across the bloc, dovetailing with the European Green Deal and the Fit-for-55 packages. Those targets sit alongside stringent energy‑saving obligations, so that windows, walls, and boilers get just as much attention as turbines, panels, and storage batteries.

A new spotlight falls on the people who use the power. Under Article 10.3, households and small businesses gain a seat at the table: they can pool together in energy communities, swap clean electrons peer-to-peer, and tap into greener loans and subsidies. It’s an invitation for everyone (from city apartment-dwellers to rural cooperatives) to shape the energy transition rather than watch it unfold.

Crucially for data-driven services, the Directive demands a digital backbone. Member States must adopt common data‑exchange standards so that national systems can “speak” to one another and roll out advanced metering infrastructures that feed real-time consumption figures back to grids and platforms. Those data streams will unlock smarter forecasting, dynamic pricing tools and novel apps to orchestrate demand‑side flexibility. In short, EU law now recognises that renewables and digitisation are two sides of the same coin.