Title: Transport, the strategic issue at stake for the future of natural gas in Europe: avoidance of hidden collusion and implementation of efficient pricing

Authors: Laurent David, Jacques Percebois

Addresses: CREDEN, Centre de Recherche en Economie et Droit de l'Energie, University of Montpellier I, BP 9606, 34 054 Montpellier, Cedex, France. CREDEN, Centre de Recherche en Economie et Droit de l'Energie, University of Montpellier I, BP 9606, 34 054 Montpellier, Cedex, France

Abstract: Two main conditions must simultaneously be met for the European gas market to become a competitive market: 1) the absence of collusion among the various actors; 2) the setting of a fair and efficient tariff system for the gas pipelines. In order to evaluate the possibility of collusion among European operators, we give in the first part of the paper a picture of the different actors involved in the upstream segment and the transport-distribution one. We show in the second part that the regulators have to make two kinds of choices concerning the transport system pricing with TPA: 1) a choice concerning the type of control (price cap or cost plus); 2) a choice concerning the allocation of fixed costs between the capacity-booking charges and the actual transportation cost charges.

Keywords: collusion; oligopoly; transport tariffs; price cap; cost plus; allocation of fixed costs.

DOI: 10.1504/IJGEI.2001.000924

International Journal of Global Energy Issues, 2001 Vol.16 No.4, pp.287-299

Published online: 18 Aug 2003 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article