• The Monopolies Commission has criticised the negative impact on competition resulting from the inefficient structuring of the energy transition. In the Monopolies Commission’s view, the energy transition is currently suffering from a lack of focus on competition.
• The Monopolies Commission is calling for a significantly more competition-oriented approach to government energy policy. In the field of renewable energies, it recommends in particular the introduction of a subsidy scheme modelled on the Swedish system. 

The Monopolies Commission is today presenting its fourth special report pursuant to Section 62 of the Energy Industry Act, entitled ‘Energy 2013: Competition in the Age of the Energy Transition’. This in-depth analysis of the German electricity and gas markets highlights competition and efficiency issues across various markets within the energy sector and contains numerous proposals for efficiently resolving existing problems. One key focus of the Monopolkommission’s report is the structure of the energy transition. Here, it identifies significant efficiency shortfalls – e.g. due to excessive subsidies – which are responsible for additional cost and price increases. These cost increases result not only from the current subsidies for renewable energies, but also from the necessary grid expansion and new balancing mechanisms. As a result of the enormous structural changes brought about by the energy transition, some regulations that are not in line with competition have been introduced and urgently require adjustment. Among other things, the Monopolies Commission proposes converting the support for renewable energies to a competitive and technology-neutral quota model based on the Swedish model, to effectively manage the geographical location of generation plants through a component in grid tariffs, and to avoid precipitously causing further cost increases by introducing capacity markets.