Walter Boltz
Biography
Walter Boltz works with Baker McKenzie as senior energy advisor since 2016 and is a member of the Antitrust & Competition Practice Group in Baker McKenzie’s Vienna office. He is a former vice-chair of the ACER Board of Regulators and vice-president of the Council of European Energy Regulators (CEER). Walter headed the Austrian Regulatory Authority E-Control for 15 years. Furthermore, he chaired the ACER and CEER Gas Working Groups for many years. In this period the Third Energy Package, the Security of Supply Regulation and the Energy Infrastructure Package were discussed, developed and implemented. Under his auspices, the first and the second Gas Target Model were developed together with the involvement of market participants.
Walter has worked on electricity and gas issues for more than fifteen years and in management and consulting for more than thirty years. In his role as executive director of E-Control, Walter was responsible for electricity and gas market regulation as well as renewable energies.
He served five years on the advisory board of EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute) and was recently re-appointed to the ERRA Strategic Advisory Council. Walter is also a member of the advisory board of the Florence School of Regulation and a frequent speaker at international energy and gas conferences.
Practice Focus
Walter advises international clients from the energy sector on strategic topics in relation to regulatory and energy strategy aspects. He is currently active in Austria Germany, Ukraine and Moldova as well as in Brussels at the EU level.
In his everyday work, he decides on issues such as network regulation, design of gas and power transmission tariffs and access arrangements, design of electricity and gas trading arrangements, gas storage regulation, security of supply protocols, network development planning as well as contract disputes and antitrust issues.
Representative Legal Matters
Besides working with Baker McKenzie Vienna on energy focused projects, he has been engaged in projects with:
- The EU Commission - projects in the field of sector coupling, hydrogen regulation and renewables
- The ENTSOG - long-term strategic advice on the development of the EU regulatory framework
- The Austrian Federal Government - strategic consulting of the BMK in the field of gas
- A major German automotive company - development of scenarios for securing energy supply
- The Frontier Economics - studies on sector coupling, hydrogen regulation
- The WKOÖ - strategic consulting in energy topics
- An international infrastructure fund - support in the evaluation of energy suppliers
- An Austrian energy company - support in acquisitions and company valuation
- A renewable investment fund - support in regulatory issues related to the construction of large PV plants
Education
- Vienna University of Technology (Technical Physics) (1987)
Languages
- English
- German