Stek victorious for Liander in transport capacity dispute

Stek has successfully represented energy distribution company Liander in a preliminary ruling procedure against one of its customers. The customer, connected to Liander’s electricity network in Noord-Holland, ignored a transport capacity cap imposed on him by Liander because of congestion in the electricity network. The customer did not comply with the connection and transport agreement and jumped the queue of customers also waiting for additional transport capacity. Liander could not allow this, because of the consequences for the integrity and safety of the network. Liander initiated proceedings at the Amsterdam District Court and claimed the customer be ordered to comply with the contracted transport capacity. The court sided with Liander and upheld Liander’s claims. It is for the first time that Liander actively sought to enforce the contracted transport capacity vis à vis a customer in an area with network congestion.

Liander: “We regret that we can no longer provide the desired amount of transport capacity to every customer. We nevertheless try our best to do so. Unfortunately we see more and more that customers connected to Liander’s electricity network do not comply with the contracted transport capacity in areas with network congestion. In doing so, these customers endanger the voltage quality of the network and the security of supply. Until this point, we had been able to convince customers to comply. This customer ignored urgent requests to change its behaviour, leaving Liander no other choice than to initiate proceedings – an unusual step for Liander. This judgment provides clarity that Liander rightfully makes its customers comply with the contracted maximum transport capacity.”

Please click here for Liander’s press release and here for the judgment (in Dutch).