ACER monitors the effective implementation of the Gas Balancing Net​work Code​ and shares its findings in dedicated reports. Most reports used an enhanced review of the country assessments for all or a large subset of balancing zones, focusing on key features of the balancing design.

What are the main findings?

Interim measures have been terminated in most countries and Code implementation has reached a high degree across Europe, with a few exceptions due to structural market limitations.

What does ACER say?

ACER recommends to increase transparency on information provision, also beyond the minimum requirements, and to explore possible efficiency gains (e.g. via balancing zone mergers) to overcome the persisting structural market limitations that do not allow full code implementation.

What is the Balancing Analytical Framework and how it can serve monitoring?

The Balancing Analytical Framework builds on analysing neutrality as a key indicator to understand robust gas accounting and wider regime performance. The Balancing Analytical Framework serves as a quantitative comparison tool, to quantify whether the role of the TSO is residual in balancing or whether network users play an active role, while shedding light on imbalance price differences and neutrality accounting. The framework facilitates comparisons between various balancing regimes in the European Union. The data used in the analysis was provided by ENTSOG and complemented and validated by the Agency. ​

Workshops

​To facilitate the discussion and sharing of best practices on the Code's implementation, a series of workshops was organised. These debates included inputs from the Agency, ENTSOG and representatives of the network user community.​​​​

ACER gas balancing dashboard

Check out ACER's gas balancing dashboard & learn how to interact with it.

The North West (NW) region has been inactive since 2014. Cooperation continues on a bilateral or multilateral basis, outside the setting of the GRI.

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The region was formed by the following countries:

• Belgium

• Denmark

• France

• Germany

• Ireland

• Luxemburg

• Netherlands

• Sweden

• United Kingdom

• Norway (observer, non-EU country)

The region produces, and consumes, the highest amount of gas in Europe. The region also hosts the most developed gas markets and hubs in the EU.

The South South-East (SSE) region includes 20 countries: 12 EU Member States, plus 8 Energy Community Contracting Parties.

The South South-East Gas Regional Initiative is composed of:

• Austria

• Bulgaria

• Croatia

• Cyprus

• Czech Republic

• Greece

• Hungary

• Italy

• Poland

• Romania

• Slovakia

• Slovenia

Participating Energy Community Contracting Parties:

• Albania

• Bosnia and Herzegovina

• Kosovo

• Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia

• Moldova

• Montenegro

• Serbia

• Ukraine

The region is co-chaired by ERC and E-Control (respectively the North Macedonian and Austrian energy regulator).

The participation of the Energy Community in the GRI SSE is the result of an intensified cooperation started in 2014. Since then, the Energy Community Secretariat has joined the meetings together with the Contracting Parties.​​

The South Gas Regional Initiative is composed of:

• Spain

• Portugal

• France

The Spanish Commission for Markets and Competition (CNMC) leads the Initiative, whose long-term goal is to integrate France, Portugal and Spain into a single regional gas market. ​

Moving forward the further integration of the Spanish and Portuguese markets, Transmission System Operators have proposed a new algorithm to offer cross-border day-ahead interruptible capacity as bundled product.