Energy, Estonia, EU – Baltic States, Legislation

The fine was meted out to Elering AS on Nov. 4.

A disruption occurred in the functioning of the Estlink 2 undersea electricity transmission cable between Estonia and Finland as a result of maintenance and dredging works conducted at the cable by Elering in June 2014. The Competition Authority accused Elering of failure to disclose internal information on time, thus violating the obligation to communicate internal information set out in REMIT.

Elering CEO Taavi Veskimagi said Elering will contest the decision of the Competition Authority in a court of law.

"Throughout the years, Elering has acted in the disclosure of electricity market information pursuant to the same rules as other system operators of the countries that are part of the Nord Pool Spot electricity exchange. Disclosure of information about a disruption takes place when the disruption has been approved by the respective system operator's electricity system control center," Veskimagi said.

"We will contest the decision of the Competition Authority because it is incompetent and basing one's actions on it in the forwarding of market announcements in the future would cause a lot of confusion," the Elering CEO said. He added that, for instance, it means that the forwarding of market announcements concerning the Estlink cables would happen based on different principles at Elering and Fingrid.

According to REMIT, the obligation to disclose inside information lies with the market participant, and the disclosure obligation relates not only to inside information in respect of the market participant's own business or facilities, but also to inside information of the market participant's parent undertaking or related undertaking. In addition, the disclosure obligation is not only related to inside information in respect of business or facilities which the market participant or the respective undertakings owns, but also in respect of inside information they control or for whose operational matters that market participant or undertaking is responsible, even in part only.