It is a key principle of European law: member states are obliged to transpose the provisions of directives into their national laws within the set deadlines. In practice, these deadlines are becoming increasingly tight. If they fail to do so, the European Commission can impose sanctions. The infringement procedure begins by sending the Member State concerned a request for information--the equivalent of a letter of formal notice--to which it must respond within a specified period. If the member state does not respond, or if the commission is not satisfied with the response, it can issue a reasoned opinion. If it fails to do so--and this is the third stage--the European executive can then refer the matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union.

On 27 March, the European Commission challenged, amongst others, Luxembourg over four directives.

—The first challenge relates to Directive (EU) 2024/1711 on improving the organisation of the EU’s electricity market. Adopted at the height of the recent energy crisis, the directive aims to make electricity prices more stable for consumers and less dependent on the price of fossil fuels. The text should have been transposed by 17 January at the latest, with the exception of the provisions on supplier choice and energy sharing, for which the deadline is 17 July 2026. To date, only Denmark has met its obligations. The other 26 member states have letters of formal notice giving them two months to complete their transposition and communicate their measures to the European Commission.

—Nine states--Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Greece, Luxembourg, Austria, Poland, Romania and Slovenia--are in the firing line for failing to transpose the provisions on the phasing out of financial incentives for standalone fossil-fuel boilers laid down in the revised directive on the energy performance of buildings. These incentives should have disappeared on 1 January. The offenders have received a letter of formal notice.

—Luxembourg is also implicated for the non-transposition of social legislation relating to road transport activities as defined by delegated directive (EU) 2024/846. Along with 15 other member states, it has been served with a formal notice.

—Formal notice has also been served on Luxembourg for its failure to fully transpose the directive on 2-methyloxolane as an extraction solvent used in the production of foodstuffs and food ingredients. In addition to the grand duchy, Denmark, Austria, Portugal and Sweden are also affected.

—The European Commission has also penalised 13 member states (Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark, Greece, Spain, France, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Slovenia) for failing to transpose the Digital Operational Resilience Act relating to the digital operational resilience of financial entities. The text was adopted by Luxembourg last July and has been .

This article was originally published in .