A very interesting ruling regarding the green energy support schemes in the Member States has been taken in the Case-573/12, which basically analyzed the possibility of the Member States to include, in their national legislation, territorial limitations - solely national established companies to benefit from the awarded incentives.

For the moment, as the legislation is, the Member States may include such limitations, but, as per the Court's decision, it may be that in the future - looking at the 2020-2030 energy and climate change proposals of EU Commission to have an environment whereby such limitations will not be in accordance with the Free movement of goods provided in Article 34 TFEU.

The Romanian version may be found at: http://curia.europa.eu/juris/liste.jsf?language=en&jur=C,T,F&num=c-573/12&td=ALL

The Court's conclusions are - quote

"1) Point (k) of the second paragraph of Article 2 and Article 3(3) of Directive 2009/28/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2009 on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources and amending and subsequently repealing Directives 2001/77/EC and 2003/30/EC are to be interpreted as meaning that:

• national legislation under which producers of green electricity are awarded green certificates of which electricity suppliers and certain users must compulsorily purchase a certain quota according to the total volume of energy that they supply or consume is a support scheme within the meaning of that directive;
• where a Member State introduces such a scheme, it may reserve the award of green certificates exclusively to green electricity production installations located on its territory.

2) Article 34 TFEU precludes national legislation under which producers of electricity from renewable energy sources are awarded green certificates of which electricity suppliers and certain users must compulsorily purchase a certain quota according to the total volume of energy that they supply or consume, to the extent that it precludes from access to that support scheme producers whose production sites are located in the territory of another Member State.

3) Article 3(3) of Directive 2009/28 is invalid in that it confers on Member States the power to prohibit, or to restrict, access to their support schemes on the part of producers whose sites for the production of electricity from renewable energy sources are located in another Member State.

4) That invalidity will take effect two years after the delivery of the judgment."