Unsteady Foundations: The European Commission’s New Approach to Infrastructure State Aid

Traditionally, the European Commission’s (EC) approach towards public funding of infrastructure was that such aid fell outside the scope of State aid rules. Recent investigations show that this approach is changing, as the scope for commercial exploitation of infrastructure has increased due to increased liberalization, privatization, market integration and technological progress. The renaming of one of the EC’s units to Infrastructure and Regional aid also clearly signals that the EC is carefully re-examining the boundaries between the construction of public infrastructure that is freely accessible (and therefore not State aid) and infrastructure that is dedicated to a particular investor (which amounts to State aid).