Marianne Andvord

We welcome the promotion of Marianne Andvord as a partner at our firm, thereby strengthening our position in the fields of renewable energy, infrastructure and regulatory matters.

The establishment of data centers is a highly debated topic among policymakers, municipalities, and industry stakeholders in Norway. The recent judgment from the Court of Appeal (LB-2024-139780), which addressed the interpretation of Hadsel Municipality’s zoning plan, has brought new legal questions to the forefront.

On 9 December 2024, the Ministry of Energy and the Ministry of Finance presented a proposal for a new scheme for sharing renewable energy within commercial areas. The aim of the scheme is to facili-tate the sharing of locally produced energy within defined commercial zones, thereby providing in-centives for investments in renewable energy production, including solar power on commercial build-ings.

As a part of efforts to facilitate a more consumer-friendly electricity market, the government today proposed changes to the Energy Act, the Marketing Act, and the Consumer Purchase Act. The bill, which affects both electricity suppliers and end-users, will now be presented to the Norwegian Parliament, “Stortinget”, for final review.

In August 2023, the government announced what is described as a "power and industry boost for Finnmark". The government's goal is for both more grid and new power production to be in place by 2030. On April 25, NVE held an information meeting where an update was given on NVE's work to strengthen the grid and production capacity in Finnmark.

Fortunately, the power situation in Norway is now far more reassuring than it was when the government announced the new control mechanism in the fall of 2022. Although power prices in southern Norway are higher than what we have previously been used to in Norway, NVE considers the resource situation to be good. Despite this, power producers are still subject to a separate reporting scheme until May 2024.

PST presented the National Threat Assessment (NTA) for 2024. It is important for Norwegian businesses to be oriented with this assessment, although there are still some fundamental questions that need to be addressed.

Before the New Year, the Ministry of Petroleum and Energy, now the Ministry of Energy, submitted Prop. 33 L (2023-2024) on amendments to the Watercourse Regulation Act and the Energy Act to strengthen security of supply to the Storting. The bill is being considered by the Storting's Energy and Environment Committee, which will submit its recommendation by February 13, 2024. The bill fol-lows up on the government's proposal for a new governance mechanism.