EMEA Sustainability "Investor FAQs on the latest energy security note:..."

Research evidence excerpt

EMEA Sustainability "Investor FAQs on the latest energy security note:..."

Our response: We believe it is important to anchor this discussion in the numbers.

Recent estimates point to €4.3bn of remedial and redispatch costs across Europe, which

in isolation may not appear large at the system level. The more important point,

however, is the direction of travel: these costs have been rising steadily and are

symptomatic of a system under increasing stress, rather than a one-off dislocation.

In that context, the signal is less about the absolute € figure and more about what it

reflects operationally. Rising intervention volumes indicate that the system is increasingly

being managed through corrective actions rather than structural capacity, suggesting

that grids are operating closer to their limits. As a result, congestion should not be

viewed as a cyclical artefact that will normalise with changing market conditions, but

rather as a structural constraint that is intensifying over time.

The implication is that the impact of congestion is not confined to a single year’s cost,

but lies in the pressure it creates on policy, permitting and investment decisions,

ultimately accelerating the need for grid expansion and reinforcement.

3) Interconnection: the gap is understood, the debate is now about how it

closes

The interconnection section resonated, particularly the corridor framing (Iberia, core

Europe, Nordics), and investors broadly agreed with the identification of lagging regions

and countries below target. The note’s mapping of structural gaps across Europe was

seen as clear and well articulated.

Discussion instead focused on what those gaps imply in practice:

How quickly interconnection capacity can realistically expand;