Recent developments in natural gas sector
(Article by Mira Todorovic Symeonides and Stavroula Antoniou, published in the Energy & Natural Resources Newsletter of the ILO on February 6, 2017)
Introduction
Unlike in most other EU countries, natural gas became part of the Greek market only recently
following the launch of organised commercial import of natural gas at the end of 1996. Until then, gas
was mainly used for electricity generation. Although the Greek supply and transmission of natural
gas has not yet reached maturity, there have been significant attempts to liberalise the market in the
past decade, particularly in the past couple of years.
Greece’s natural gas market is now regulated by Law 4001/2011,(1) which was introduced in order to
incorporate the EU Gas Directive (2009/73/EC).
The Greek natural gas market is dominated by:
- the public natural gas company DEPA;
- DEPA’s 100% subsidiary National Natural Gas System Operator SA (DESFA) (unbundled from
- DEPA in 2007, in compliance with Law 3428/2005 and Presidential Decrees 33/2007 and
34/2007);(2) - two gas supply companies in which DEPA has a 51% share; and
- three distribution companies (two of which DEPA has a 51% share, while the third is DEPA’s
100% subsidiary).
DEPA was established in 1988 with the aim of developing infrastructure for the transmission and
distribution of natural gas in Greece. The government holds a 65% share in DEPA, while the rest is
held by Hellenic Petroleum AE. Today, DEPA:
- imports natural gas;
- supplies gas to customers;
- sells gas to suppliers;
- distributes gas to areas not covered by the grid; and
- sells gas for motor vehicles.
The main competencies of DESFA include:
- providing access to the grid for all users on a transparent and non-discriminatory basis and in
a safe, adequate, reliable and economically efficient way; - receiving natural gas from the national grid’s entry points, transporting it through the national
grid and delivering it to the network’s exit points, allocating the load among the users and
undertaking to ensure the quality of natural gas; and - balancing and calculating the imbalance between deliveries and offtakes.
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