With the Energy Act coming into force on 1 January, the Netherlands has taken an important step towards transparent, secure and sovereign energy data. A central role in this transition has been assigned to Het Normo, which has officially been designated as the Data Exchange Entity (in Dutch: gegevensuitwisselingsentiteit, GUE). What does this mean in practice? And why does this legislation affect far more than just technology? We spoke with Klaas Hommes, Director of Het Normo and member of the Advisory Board of CoE-DSC.
From closed messaging to shared data
According to Hommes, the Energy Act marks a clear shift in how the energy sector handles data. Where energy data was for years primarily exchanged through closed message flows between grid operators and suppliers, the new legislation includes a dedicated chapter on data and data exchange.
“Until now, energy data was essentially always packaged into messages and hardly shared at all,” Hommes explains. “Even though that data is of interest to many more parties than just the traditional market roles.” This concerns relatively basic information about connections, meters and consumption, which is essential for applications such as energy advice, price comparison services, heat pumps, solar panels and energy hubs.
Hommes believes the barrier was not so much technological, but organisational. “The rules of the game were not designed for sharing. As a result, something simple quickly became unnecessarily complicated.”
One independent coordinator
With Het Normo, the sector now has, for the first time, an independent entity responsible for data exchange. As the designated GUE, Het Normo ensures that energy data, spread across different registers and systems, becomes available in a uniform way, provided the connection holder grants permission.
Importantly, Het Normo itself will not become a central database where all energy data is stored. “Data remains at the source,” Hommes stresses. “Grid operators and other register holders remain responsible for their own records. We provide the link and ensure that data is only shared upon request and with the explicit consent of the connection holder, to a party that needs it.”
This independent position has been deliberately structured without any commercial interest and with full autonomy in both action and decision-making. This is formally embedded in the governance structure: the statutes provide for an advisory board in which no party holds a privileged position. As the designated GUE, Het Normo operates in a reasonable, transparent and non-discriminatory manner. Thanks to this independent role, data remains at the source, while access to energy data is organised uniformly at a national level.
Decision-making authority as a break with the past
In addition to this independent role, the Energy Act introduces another striking change: Het Normo is granted decision-making authority.
Where the energy sector has long been characterised by consultation structures in which decisions could become stalled, the law now explicitly states that one party can take final decisions. “The sector can debate endlessly,” says Hommes. “But if no agreement is reached, we make the decision. That is legally established.” This represents a break from previous voluntary frameworks that often collapsed due to commercial interests and veto powers.
Hommes acknowledges that this new role will not automatically make Het Normo popular. “Grid operators are losing their data monopoly as a result.” Still, he expects the true impact of this change will only become visible later. “Many people have no idea what energy data belongs to them, where it is stored, or who has access to it. As long as that remains the case, real control remains an abstract concept.”
The new system therefore concerns not only infrastructure, but also awareness. By making consent explicit and transparent, citizens and businesses will, for the first time, truly recognise their role. “In practice, data sharing means people can actually make choices about their own data. That may well be the biggest change of all.”
To support this growing awareness across the sector, additional instruments are being developed to provide clearer insight into what energy data is available and under which conditions it can be shared. The Energiedatawijzer serves as a central knowledge platform for the energy sector and helps make data sharing more concrete and accessible, step by step.
Consent as a hard requirement
Consent lies at the heart of the new system: without a mandate, no data. To make this practically workable, Het Normo developed the energy data portal enKiy, a consent service that Hommes describes as the “iDEAL of the energy sector”. “You can compare it to paying online,” Hommes explains. “You log in with a service provider, are briefly redirected to enKiy to give consent, and then the flow continues seamlessly.”
At present, enKiy uses existing identification methods such as DigiD and eHerkenning. At the same time, Het Normo is clearly looking ahead. Wallet-based solutions are seen as the logical next step to make identities more flexible, robust and future-proof. “The specific tool doesn’t matter to us,” says Hommes. “As long as it meets the regulator’s requirements.”
Renovating while the shop stays open
Initially, 1 January 2026 seemed like a tight deadline for implementing the Energy Act and designating Het Normo as the Data Exchange Entity. In practice, Hommes emphasises, the situation is more nuanced. “This is not something we only started building over the past year. We’ve been working on this since 2020. In fact, we began as though the law already existed.”
The agreements framework, governance and organisational structure have therefore been in development for years, ahead of the formal legislation. As of 1 January, the legal mandate has mainly been added. “That doesn’t mean everything is suddenly finished,” Hommes says. “Data exchange and modernising IT landscapes simply take time.”
This phased approach is deliberate. Data sharing via Het Normo will be introduced step by step: first for large-scale consumers, later also for small-scale users. Meanwhile, the energy sector must continue functioning as people are used to. Billing, reconciliation and balancing must all continue as normal. “You can’t tell nine million connections: we’re working on it, the bill will come later,” Hommes says. “This really is a renovation while the shop remains open.”
A model for other sectors?
Could Het Normo’s approach serve as a blueprint for other sectors, such as healthcare or mobility? “In principle, yes,” says Hommes. “But the energy sector is relatively manageable because there are fewer parties involved compared with other sectors. That makes sector-wide agreements easier.”
The real lesson, he believes, lies in governance: a clear legal mandate, an independent entity with decision-making authority, and a strict separation between data, coordination and commercial interests. “If you don’t organise this properly, you either remain stuck in voluntary arrangements or you risk one commercial party accumulating all the power. That ultimately doesn’t work.”
Learning together with CoE-DSC
Hommes sees great value in CoE-DSC. As a member of the Advisory Board, he brings in experiences from the energy sector, but he is also keen to learn from others. “We don’t know everything,” he says. “Especially on topics like wallets and digital identity, we need to learn from others.”
According to Hommes, knowledge sharing is just as important as data sharing. “Every sector thinks it is unique, but the patterns are often the same. If you dare to recognise that, you can move forward much faster.”
