Aims and importance of a unique association and its publications
MARCOGAZ was founded in Brussels in 1968 as a non-profit association of companies in the gas sector. The association’s members include gas companies, research organisations and gas network operators.
MARCOGAZ aims to enable members of the European gas industry to speak with one voice. Its tasks include advising European legislators on relevant national and supranational legislative procedures. MARCOGAZ also helps to develop new technical standards in the gas sector. In the same way that the relevant parties – manufacturing experts, utility companies, consumers, academia and public bodies – in individual countries work together to develop technical standards for the gas industry in their country, the aim is to create a unifying and universally binding legal framework at supranational level too, which sets the standards for the European gas industry. MARCOGAZ contributes to the preparation, creation and interpretation of this legal framework through independent investigations and analyses, pooling of specialist expertise and the involvement of all stakeholders.
MARCOGAZ currently has 30 members and 32 partners in 20 European countries. In the association’s seven technical groups (Gas Supply & Carbon Capture, Midstream Gas System, Downstream Gas System, Gas Usage, Gas Quality and Metering, Health & Safety and Methane Emissions+), more than 400 experts are working to develop the technical knowledge that is required, among other things, for interpreting existing standards and for redesigning future uniform European standards in the gas industry.
The publications produced by MARCOGAZ as part of this process are not legal standards themselves – they can therefore only become directly legally binding if a European or national legislator declares them legally binding. But even where this is not the case, these publications can have indirect legal validity: as the products of work undertaken by pan-European expert bodies, they have particular evidential value. The research and work findings documented in these publications contribute to the current state of the art, which courts and administrative authorities can use as guidance in their free assessment of evidence.
With its statements and publications, MARCOGAZ also makes a major contribution to achieving an overarching European ideal: the single market. The unified European standards – which MARCOGAZ helps to create – mean that national standards are recognised as barriers to trade and are overcome.
The MARCOGAZ system is based on these core beliefs. It deals with all technical matters concerning the European gas industry. MARCOGAZ experts observe and advise on technical regulation, standardisation and certification processes in Europe with regard to the integrity and security of pipeline systems, infrastructure and rational energy use. MARCOGAZ supports standardisation efforts and advises national and supranational legislators as well as standardisation bodies and companies in the gas industry. For over five decades, knowledge and professional excellence have been pooled here for the greater good – for the benefit of everyone.