Request on lobbying on ETS, mid April -end of June 2016
From: Belen Balanya, Corporate Europe Observatory
Brussels, 29 June April 2016
RE: Access to Documents related to ETS review
Dear sirs,
Referring to Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 on public access to EU documents and to the 'Aarhus Regulation' (see note) , I would herewith like to ask for access to the following:
- all correspondence (including email) since 15 April 2016 between the Commissioner for Climate Action and/or his cabinet and/or officials and representatives of DG CLIMA on one hand and representatives from BusinessEurope, CEFIC, Eurofer, the European Rountable for Industrialists (ERT), The Alliance of Energy Intensive Industries, Gas Naturally, Center for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Eurelectric, Cembureau, ZEP (Zero Emissions Platform), RWE, Repsol, Shell, ArcellorMital, IFIEC Europe, BDI (Federation of German Industries), the European Bioeconomy Alliance, BASF and/or Lafarge on the other, in which the issue of the review of the EU ETS Directive was addressed.
- list of meetings since 17 April 2016 between officials and representatives of DG CLIMA on one hand (excluding the Commissioner for Climate Action and/or his cabinet and the Director General) and representatives from BusinessEurope, CEFIC, Eurofer, the European Rountable for Industrialists (ERT), The Alliance of Energy Intensive Industries, Gas Naturally, Center for European Policy Studies (CEPS), Eurelectric, Cembureau, ZEP (Zero Emissions Platform), RWE, Repsol, Shell, ArcellorMital, IFIEC Europe, BDI (Federation of German Industries), the European Bioeconomy Alliance, BASF and/or Lafarge on the other, in which the issue of the review of the EU ETS Directive was addressed.
- minutes of the meetings mentioned above
I would like to make clear I prefer you produce the documents on a rolling basis.
At no point should the Commission’s search for—or deliberations concerning—certain documents delay the production of others that the Commission has already retrieved and elected to produce.
To the extent possible, we prefer the documents in electronic format. Documents that cannot be sent in electronic format should be sent to Corporate Europe Observatory, Rue d’Edimbourg 26, 1050 Brussels.
Should my request be denied wholly or partially, please explain the denial or all deletions referring to specific exemptions in the regulation. Also I expect the partial release of documents, in case of partial exemption according to article 4.6.
I reserve the right to appeal.
Please confirm having received this application. I look forward to your reply within 15 business days, according to the regulation.
Thank you for your assistance.
Belen Balanya
Corporate Europe Observatory
Note: See Regulation (EC) n. 1367/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 September 2006 on the application of the provisions of the Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters to Community Institutions and bodies (hereinafter "Aarhus Regulation")
Yours faithfully,
Belen Balanya
Dear Mrs Balanya,
Thank you for your email dated 29th June.
We hereby acknowledge receipt of your application for access to documents, which was registered on the 30th June 2016 under reference number GestDem 2016/3621.
In accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents, your application will be handled within 15 working days. The time limit expires on 22nd July 2016.
In case this time limit needs to be extended, you will be informed in due course.
You have lodged your application via the AsktheEU.org website. Please note that this is a private website which has no link with any institution of the European Union. Therefore the European Commission cannot be held accountable for any technical issues or problems linked to the use of this system.
Yours sincerely,
Mathilde CREPY
Access to document team
European Commission
DG Climate Action
Unit 001 – Administrative and Legal Support, Liaison with SRD
Dear Ms Balanya,
We refer to your e-mail dated 29 June 2016 in which you make a request for
access to documents, registered on 30 June 2016 under the above mentioned
reference number.
Your application is currently being handled. However, we will not be in a
position to complete the handling of your application within the time
limit of 15 working days, which expires on 22 July 2016.
An extended time limit is needed as your application concerns documents
which originate from third parties who are being consulted.
Therefore, we have to extend the time limit with 15 working days in
accordance with Article 7(3) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 regarding
public access to documents. The new time limit expires on 12 August 2016.
We apologise for this delay and for any inconvenience this may cause.
Yours faithfully,
Danielle SMITH
Access to Documents team
European Commission
Directorate-General for Climate Action
Av. de Beaulieu 24
1049 Brussels
Dear Ms Balanya,
Enclosed please find an advance copy of our reply.
Sincerely,
Danielle SMITH
Access to Documents team
European Commission
Directorate-General for Climate Action
Av. de Beaulieu 24
1049 Brussels
Dear Danielle,
Thanks for your response and sorry to get back to it so long afterwards.
I'd like if possible a confirmation that this was actually all the correspondence on ETS review (this is indirectly on ETS but more about the electricity market design) by the companies and groups listed in my request during that period. Seems surprisingly little,
Yours faithfully,
Belen Balanya
Dear Ms Balanya,
We confirm that those were the documents we identified as corresponding to your request.
Kind regards,
Access to Documents team
European Commission
Directorate-General for Climate Action
Av. de Beaulieu 24
1049 Brussels