ENTSOG BAL NC Monitoring Report 2016

1 Introduction and Purpose

NC BAL was published on 27 March 2014 and applies to balancing zones within the borders of the EU  1) . It establishes rules for natural gas balancing, including network- related rules on nomination procedures, imbalance charges, settlement processes associated with daily imbalance charges and provisions on operational balancing. Its implementation shall also account for the specific nature of interconnectors. 2) For countries like Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Luxembourg and Malta that hold derogation on the basis of Article 49 of Directive 2009/73/EC, it is not mandatory to apply NC BAL. In this implementation report ENTSOG continues to monitor the implementation of NC BAL by 1 October 2016 in accordance with Article 8(8) of Regulation (EC) No 715/2009. The results will be published in 2017 in the ENTSOG Annual Report 2016.

1) Energy Community Contracting Parties will follow the Code implementation based on deadlines agreed by their Ministerial Council. The implemen- tation of the BAL NC in these Countries is not in the scope of this report. 2) Recital (8) of BAL NC. Due to the specific nature of interconnectors, IUK and BBL implemented the BAL network code on an “in = out” principle, whereby a network user’s delivery nominations must equal its offtake nominations. As such, network users cannot be exposed to an imbalance and there is no need to take balancing actions. Therefore, many of the requirements of NC BAL do not apply. Where BAL does apply, e. g. relevant rules on nominations, IUK and BBL have taken all reasonable steps to ensure compliance with the requirements. This approach was approved by the relevant NRAs.

8 |

ENTSOG BAL NC Monitoring Report 2016