The energy bottleneck is an important issue at the EU summit in Brussels.
Meanwhile, Germany is proposing a new concept.
Berlin - The heads of state and government of the EU are fighting for a European solution to the problem of the dramatically rising energy prices.
Chancellor Angela Merkel pleaded for a market economy solution at an EU summit on Thursday.
The Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, on the other hand, spoke out in favor of reforming the European electricity markets.
Poland and Hungary meanwhile blamed the European climate measures for the high prices.
The dramatic rise in energy prices was the main topic at the summit in Brussels.
Prices - especially for gas - have been skyrocketing for months.
The agenda included proposals from the Commission to protect consumers from high heating and electricity costs.
These include tax cuts, payments to affected households or subsidies for small businesses.
Several countries have already taken such measures.
However, states like Spain or France are calling for more far-reaching measures at EU level.
So far there is no consensus on this, the federal government, for example, is critical.
Merkel before the last EU summit: the energy crisis is the central topic of the negotiations
Germany will "not switch off the market completely", but "provide more market," said Merkel. To this end, further social support measures could be taken, such as improving housing benefits, said the Chancellor. Even before the current debate on energy prices, the federal government had already taken measures to relieve households. In addition to the housing benefit, this also includes a reduction in the EEG surcharge to promote green electricity from state funds and an increase in the commuter allowance.
The positions of the countries are still far apart.
This is also due to the fact that they are affected differently by the skyrocketing prices.
In Germany, for example, the price of gas has risen much less than Spain.
This is due, among other things, to the different energy mixes and the fact that Germany has concluded long-term gas purchase contracts, while Spain buys on the spot market, where prices fluctuate more.
Video: High energy prices and Poland hot topics at the upcoming EU summit
EU summit in Brussels: Germany initiates a military reaction force
Another important concern of Germany at the summit is a new initiative for the establishment of a rapid EU military reaction force. The concept provides for the already existing EU battle groups to be further developed into powerful crisis reaction forces that can be deployed at short notice. To this end, space and cyber capabilities as well as special forces and strategic air transport capacities are to be provided.
"The recent events in Afghanistan have shown again that the EU must be able to (...) act robustly and swiftly," says the paper written by Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Finland and Slovenia.
For this it is necessary to improve the availability, readiness, operational capability and competence of the armed forces and to make better use of military cooperation formats among the EU member states.
Germany with initiative at EU summit: 5,000-strong reaction force in planning
Specifically, the five countries also propose to enable the deployment of “coalitions of willing” through the previously unused Article 44 of the EU Treaty.
Overall, this would enable more flexibility and a modular approach to crisis management in the EU and could increase the EU's ability to act, according to the concept paper.
In addition, existing regional collaborations should be better used.
The concept paper does not provide any specific information on the overall strength of the reaction force.
Only the land force unit intended for this purpose is said to be able to reach the size of a brigade - that could be around 5,000 soldiers.
(dpa / fmü)
