The Directive, part of the EU's 2024 hydrogen and decarbonised gas package alongside a companion Regulation, updates the rules governing the EU's natural gas market and introduces, for the first time, a dedicated regulatory framework for hydrogen infrastructure, covering matters such as third-party access, tariff-setting and unbundling requirements for dedicated hydrogen networks. Without this framework transposed into national law, infrastructure operators in most Member States lack legal certainty on questions that directly affect investment decisions, such as who can build and operate hydrogen pipelines and on what terms, a gap that helps explain why market analysts have separately reported delays across much of the planned European Hydrogen Backbone network.

Member States now have two months to respond and complete transposition before the Commission can escalate to a reasoned opinion, the next formal step in infringement proceedings. A separate set of formal notices was sent to 18 Member States over delayed transposition of electricity market rules on free choice of supplier and energy sharing, though that strand is less directly relevant to chemical producers than the hydrogen market rules.

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