This policy brief draws on recommendations and insights from EIES’ published research and analytical work. It incorporates findings, data, and analysis from EIES' publications in the past 12 months, including the following key papers: Strategic Grid Technologies for European Resilience, Blueprints for Acceleration and Against the Headwinds: Securing Europe’s Wind Sector.

Introduction

The European grid infrastructure crisis demands immediate regulatory reform and investments. The need to revitalise European manufacturing and advance new technologies and data capabilities will drive up electricity consumption. The regulatory framework that was designed for gradual infrastructure evolution no longer serves Europe's urgent demand for rapid, coordinated grid deployment at an unprecedented scale. 

Hundreds of GW of renewable energy capacity are awaiting grid connection across EU member states, as transmission planning timelines stretch up to 10 years, and EUR584 billion in investment are needed by 2030. Given these challenges, the current energy infrastructure rules, including the Trans-European Networks for Energy (TEN-E) regulation, are fundamentally inadequate for the pace of energy transition required. Grid congestion costs the EU EUR4.2 billion annually, while nearly 30 TWh of renewable electricity is curtailed due to insufficient capacity, presenting both an economic drain and a strategic vulnerability. Today’s reactive approach fails to secure the timely development of grid infrastructure, delaying the utility of strategic energy assets, particularly offshore hybrid installations.  

Europe has the capacity to address these strategic vulnerabilities with targeted regulatory reforms that can yield swift results. Legislative action under the planned European Grids Package needs to focus on increasing grid interconnections given that 32 GW of cross-border capacity required by 2030 remains unaddressed. Interconnection targets should take into account comprehensive cross-border needs assessments and opportunities for enhanced cooperation such as with the UK and Norway, particularly for North Sea offshore cooperation.

The electricity system blackout in the Iberian Peninsula illustrated the importance of increasing grid resilience through enhanced cross-border interconnections, storage development and strengthened reactive power management resources like demand-side participation. Coordinated planning with industrial electrification, electrical transport infrastructure development and demand-side management are essential, whilst sufficient energy storage capacity and demand-side flexibility need to be technically and legally implemented. However, current TEN-E rules perpetuate bureaucratic fragmentation, maintain competitive barriers between member states, and fail to prioritise strategic infrastructure resilience.  

To address this crisis, EIES sets forth four key recommendations: 

1. EU member states’ grid infrastructure planning should prioritise projects based on their strategic value and system importance rather than on the timing of grid application submissions. A strong prioritisation framework needs to integrate criteria such as the project’s ability to add energy generation capacity, grid optimisation potential, grid congestion relief and curtailment reduction (i.e. maximising use of generated renewable energy).  

2. The deployment of grid enhancing technologies that strengthen energy infrastructure and system resilience should be considered when assessing projects for EU funding. Grid digital technologies can improve the efficiency of existing grid infrastructure and optimise the use of current assets, while robotics offer solutions for monitoring, maintaining, and securing grid infrastructure. 

3. EU policies, frameworks and legislation need to focus on increasing supply chain security and the availability of critical grid components. Common supplier screenings, cybersecurity frameworks and risk assessments, diversified sourcing and “Made in Europe” rules can increase supply chain resilience. The EU must also enhance coordination with NATO and national defence and energy authorities to protect grid infrastructure and integrate energy and defence planning. 

4. EU funding for grid infrastructure should be aligned with broader EU industrial and defence objectives. It should support dual-use strategic technologies, consider the integration of CAPEX-OPEX models and ensure greater EU ownership in grid projects. 

1. Accelerated Strategic Planning and Priority Frameworks 

The TEN-E regulation and related rules must abandon the “first-come first-served" principle and implement strategic European planning approaches that prioritise projects based on strategic value rather than the timing of submission. Grid infrastructure development should lead, rather than follow generation deployment. Project evaluation procedures must prioritise grid projects that enable new generation facilities to connect efficiently, particularly for offshore hybrid assets that combine renewable generation with storage and multiple grid connection points.  

• EU member states should replace reactive connection processes based on timing of applications with strategic European planning. A combination of project- and system-centric approaches should prioritise both the project’s intrinsic qualities and its value to the overall energy system. Criteria could include the project’s ability to bring energy generation capacity into the system, grid optimisation potential, ability to deliver the project fully and on time and maturity (“first-ready”). The project’s systemic importance could be assessed through its ability to reduce grid congestion most effectively, potential to minimise renewable curtailment and ability to bring technological and geographical energy generation diversity. 

• Mandate proactive grid infrastructure development through streamlined, digitalised permitting procedures that leads rather than follows generation deployment, particularly for offshore hybrid assets combining renewable generation with storage and multiple grid connection points. 

• Deploy queue management software platforms to accelerate grid integration through enhanced transparency, coordination and status tracking.  

2. Strategic Technology Integration for Infrastructure Resilience

Grid-enhancing technologies, digital solutions, ancillary services and data management technologies can significantly increase the efficiency of existing grid capacities and maximise the use of existing assets, reducing the requirement for new infrastructure. The Commission should establish mechanisms for coordinating technology deployment across borders, particularly for energy analytics, operations and grid management systems that could provide greater benefits when implemented beyond the national scale. A comprehensive digital infrastructure for grid management can also support strategic grid planning reforms:

• EU member states should support the integration of real-time grid management systems to enhance real-time operations and crisis response. AI and machine learning for dynamic line rating (DLR) can be used to monitor and optimise flow whilst measuring real-time environmental conditions.

• The EU should work towards the establishment of pan-European data integration through improved data governance, interoperability and transparency standards. This will support asset benchmarking and grid resilience assessment to serve both security and economic objectives. 

• The EU should work towards the development of an “EUGridGPT" orchestration model - a European power grid AI system integrating transmission queue management, extreme weather response, and resilience planning, building on the US NREL eGridGPT model for control room operations. 

Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) integration - combining solar, storage, and efficiency technologies, can improve energy resilience. Projects that enable distributed generation can strengthen grid stability and reduce single points of failure. This could also have added benefits for the responsiveness, and resilience of the defence and security sector in case of cyber, hybrid and physical attacks, or incidents. 

• The TEN-E and related regulations such as on the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) must prioritise innovative technologies when assessing projects for EU funding, providing explicit incentives for solutions that enhance energy infrastructure resilience against cyber, physical, and hybrid threats.  

• EU member states need to evaluate DER integration in all new grid projects to enhance critical infrastructure resilience.  

• The EU should reform selection criteria for Projects of Common Interest (PCI)/Projects of Mutual Interest (PMI) to take into account the scale-up of strategic technology deployment and integrate strategic grid technology roadmaps into the Ten-Year Network Development Plans (TYNDPs). 

• The TEN-E regulation and related rules and guidance should support projects that integrate renewable generation, storage, and interconnections to maximise infrastructure utilisation for offshore hybrid assets. 

Robotics and automation can be utilised for grid monitoring, maintenance, and security applications. The new European Grids Package must systematically leverage Ukraine's unparalleled expertise in grid resilience under extreme conditions, integrating lessons from managing electricity systems through hybrid threats, scaling innovative dual-use technology applications, and deploying distributed energy resources for infrastructure resilience. This could additionally support the scale-up of domestic UAV industries for dual-use applications that combine grid maintenance with security functions. 

EU legislation should support the integration of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) capabilities in infrastructure inspection and monitoring. UAVs equipped with computational capabilities, cameras, and LiDAR can be deployed to inspect transmission and distribution equipment. Marine robots can monitor offshore wind farms, including marine substations and turbine blade assessment, while existing fibre-optic networks along power cables as real-time acoustic sensors can be used to detect threats, especially offshore. 

3. Supply Chain and Infrastructure Security  

A reformed TEN-E regulation must address the fundamental supply chain issues that prevent effective grid development. The European Grids Package must embed comprehensive supply chain security measures to avoid potential shortcomings in grid project delivery due to developing dependencies on single suppliers outside the EU.  

Long lead times for many grid technology components like cables and large power transformers highlight the importance of ensuring the security of supply of cable spare parts and recycling strategies for essential material and equipment.  

Supply chain security  

Supply chain security standards must be implemented to prevent critical dependencies developing during the peak investment period 2025-2030. 

• The EU should establish common security of supply assessments for cable spare parts and essential equipment with lead times extending beyond 2030.  

• EU member states should implement standardised “made in Europe” non-price criteria for energy technologies and components to reduce external risky dependencies and support European manufacturing. EU-level uniform cybersecurity rules for electric grid technologies, especially those testing grid vulnerabilities, should be implemented. 

• The EU should establish common frameworks for component screening and supplier vetting, particularly for critical systems like SCADA networks. PCI/PMI project evaluation should include strategic technology expertise and cybersecurity specialists.  

• Multi-vendor strategies for software and hardware equipment screening can be utilised to avoid over-dependence on high-risk suppliers.

• The EU needs to cooperate with NATO to assess supply chain overlaps and coordinate procurement and stockpiling programs, focusing on dual-use, smaller volume critical cable spare parts.

Security and Defence Coordination 

Grid infrastructure protection requires coordinated security approaches integrating energy and defence planning. The EU needs to prepare for increasing cybersecurity threats to power asset software platforms as DERs proliferate.  

The EU’s grid deployment efforts should be strongly aligned and coordinated not only with industrial demand and new generation powerplants, but also with the security sector to achieve common infrastructure resilience objectives. The North Sea and the Baltic Sea offer opportunities to develop energy generation and security infrastructure complementarily. Subsea cables, for instance, can function as sensor networks for maritime surveillance and data collection for both civilian and military purposes. 

• The EU needs to enhance coordination with NATO, national security authorities, energy planners, and industry through structured public-private partnerships for incident prevention, response and recovery.

• NATO’s Maritime Centre for Security of Critical Undersea Infrastructure (CUI), established in May 2024, can be leveraged to enhance monitoring, assessment, and threat deterrence for grid infrastructure.

• The EU should facilitate the integration of security and defence coordination with energy infrastructure planning to ensure comprehensive energy infrastructure resilience. 

• The EU should implement coordinated cable protection systems with standardised repair frameworks for rapid restoration, i.e. useful for damaged wind-to-grid connections.

4. Grid Infrastructure Investments

Existing financing frameworks are insufficient for the scale and urgency of required grid investment. ENTSO-E has calculated that cross-border electricity investment of EUR13 billion per year would reduce system costs by EUR23 billion per year by 2050. By 2030 the EU must invest around EUR584 billion and the UK around EUR60 billion in transmission and distribution electricity grids, including cross-border interconnectors and distribution grid adaptation.  

The budget allocated under Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) has been insufficient to expedite all PCI and PMI categories and does not cover local DSO needs. Other EU funding options such as the Cohesion Fund, ERDF, RRF or the Modernisation Fund are under-utilised, demonstrating fragmented and insufficient funding coverage. Further, traditional CAPEX- focused financing design is inadequate for modern grid needs requiring specific operational technology investments. 

It is welcome that CEF maintains its standalone budget amounting to EUR29.9 billion in the new proposed EU budget for 2028-2034. More flexibility in budget allocation to support modern grid development would be necessary to meet resilience and energy security needs. 

Reformed financing must address the dual functionality of offshore grids serving both as electricity interconnectors and renewable generation connectors, which incur higher risks that traditional mechanisms cannot address. These can be projects that demonstrate strategic technology integration and advancements in demand-side participation and storage development.  

While advancing a comprehensive financing reform that can increase and diversify equity investments, it is important that EU entities and government maintain strategic ownership control over the European grid. This is in the context of risks to critical energy infrastructure, including unauthorised technology or data transfers, economic espionage, economic coercion, supply chain and trade flow risks, illegal or hybrid and cyber-attack risks, risks to physical infrastructure.  

• The European Commission should reform CEF allocation criteria to take into account broader EU industrial and defence policies and the deployment of strategic technologies with dual-use purpose.  

• The EU should establish clear ownership preferences for EU actors or comprehensively screened foreign investors in PCI/PMI project evaluation criteria. 

• EU member states should consider multifunctional project criteria integrating security measures (sensors, monitoring systems) into grid infrastructure investments to protect the future and existing critical off- and onshore energy infrastructure. 

• The integration of CAPEX-OPEX frameworks in TEN-E project assessment should be considered, moving beyond traditional capital expenditure to include operational expenses and optimisation requirements. 

Call for Immediate Action

EIES calls for a comprehensive European Grid Package enabling accelerated grid deployment, prioritise innovative technologies when assessing projects for EU funding and provide incentives for solutions that enhance resilience against cyber, physical, and hybrid threats to energy infrastructure. A streamlined and harmonised regulatory framework should also address continued infrastructure bottlenecks that undermine energy security goals, waste energy resources, and compromise European strategic autonomy.  

Europe cannot afford incremental change when transformational reform is imperative to deliver maximum strategic value for European energy security. The integration of advanced digital systems, comprehensive DER deployment, robotics-based monitoring, and coordinated NATO-EU security frameworks represents the comprehensive approach needed to transition the energy system and achieve strategic resilience. 

Success requires moving beyond traditional grid development to artificial intelligence, robotics, and security integration - creating a resilient, intelligent European energy infrastructure. This will support the ability to withstand both market pressures and security threats, while enabling rapid energy deployment.