Portuguese Plan for Promoting Efficiency of Electricity End-Use: Policy, Methodology and Consumer Participation

The Portuguese Electricity Demand-Side Efficiency Promotion Plan (PPEC) is a voluntary financial mechanism, under which several entities, among them electric utilities, may submit proposals of measures aiming at the reduction of electricity consumption or load management. It is one of the alternative options followed by the Portuguese government to the Energy Efficiency Obligations (EEO) stated in Article 7 of the EU Energy Efficiency Directive. A brief review is presented of the state of the implementation of Article 7 in EU. PPEC is one of the schemes that provide financial support to the implementation of measures whose results contribute to the commitments made under the Portuguese National Energy Efficiency Action Plan (NEEAP), the framework under which the alternatives to the EEO were designed. In the first edition of the PPEC, only three energy services were addressed, while, in the most recent PPEC edition, the sixth, measures addressed nine energy services. In addition, the co-funding by participating consumers and other agents has increased, raising the investment in energy efficiency from actors other than the program administrator. PPEC, although a voluntary mechanism, has proven to be a very competitive one, involving an increasing number of economic agents, measures and addressed energy services.