Which types of ERE exist, and which one applies to EV charging?

ERE isn’t one single, uniform unit: the NEa distinguishes several categories, each with its own letter code and its own origin. For home charging only one category is relevant - ERE-E, the category for electricity - while most of the other categories revolve around liquid or gaseous biofuels. This article sets out the categories and explains why electric charging has its own place, without glossing over the nuances.

ERE isn’t a single unit: a short overview

Under the ERE system, every registered delivery of renewable energy is classified by the type of source it came from. That distinction exists because fuel suppliers with a reduction obligation sometimes need EREs from a specific category - similar to how the old HBE system had sub-categories for conventional and advanced biofuels. In total the NEa distinguishes six categories by energy type, five of which revolve around biofuels and one of which is specifically for electricity.

The five fuel categories: ERE-G, ERE-R, ERE-B, ERE-C and ERE-O

Code	Name	Created by registering…
ERE-G	Advanced	liquid or gaseous advanced biofuel
ERE-R	RFNBOs	for example renewable hydrogen or other renewable fuels of non-biological origin
ERE-B	Annex IX, part B	liquid or gaseous biofuel from Annex IX part B, such as used cooking oil or animal fats
ERE-C	Conventional	liquid or gaseous conventional biofuel, usually from agricultural or energy crops
ERE-O	Other	liquid or gaseous other biofuel that doesn’t fit the other categories

These five categories all revolve around fuels delivered in liquid or gaseous form, such as biodiesel, biogas or hydrogen. They mainly matter to fuel producers, importers and filling stations - not to someone charging an electric car at home.

ERE-E: the category for electricity - and so for home charging

Electricity falls outside the five fuel categories above and gets its own code: ERE-E, or ERE-Electricity. These EREs are created by registering deliveries of electricity to transport - exactly what happens when your home charge point passes registered kWh on to a registration service provider, who then files them with the Register Energie voor Vervoer (REV). For home charging, ERE-E is therefore the only relevant category. How many ERE-E your charging sessions produce is set by the formula we explain in our article on calculating EREs per kWh: electricity delivered (kWh) × renewable share × 183 g CO₂/MJ × 3.6 MJ/kWh ÷ 1,000.

Concretely: charge 4,000 kWh of grid electricity at home per year, and that same formula produces roughly 1,330.76 ERE-E. Those EREs therefore come about through a fundamentally different calculation method than, say, ERE-G from advanced biofuel, even though both ultimately represent the same thing: 1 kg of avoided CO₂ emissions compared with the fossil reference value.

Why electricity has its own category

The five fuel categories are all built around a feedstock: the raw material a liquid or gaseous fuel was made from, each with its own emissions factor. Electricity has no feedstock in that sense - there’s no consignment of fuel delivered to a filling station that can be traced back to, say, used cooking oil or sugar beet. Instead, electricity is measured in kWh, and the calculation is based on the national renewable share of the grid at the moment of delivery. That different calculation method - and the different way electricity reaches transport, via a charge point rather than a fuel pump - is the main reason electricity got its own category rather than being folded into, say, ERE-G.

Sector codes: LRE, BRE, ZRE and RARE

Besides the energy type, the REV also records which transport sector a delivery took place in. Land, inland shipping and maritime shipping each have their own sector code: LRE (land), BRE (inland shipping/binnenvaart) and ZRE (maritime shipping/zeevaart). There is also RARE, a reduction unit created by the use of RFNBOs in the production of bio- or fossil fuels, which sits outside the energy-type classification above. In practice, an ERE is therefore typed along two axes: the energy type (for example electricity or advanced biofuel) and the sector in which the delivery took place. For home charging that’s almost always the land sector, combined with the electricity energy type.

Does the category affect the price you receive?

Public price information - such as the market-wide indicative price of roughly €0.31 per ERE that applied in early September 2026 - is generally published as a single, general figure, without a breakdown by category. It’s plausible that supply and demand differ by category: fuel suppliers may have sub-targets for, say, advanced biofuels versus conventional sources versus electricity, much as was already the case under the old HBE system. However, we haven’t been able to find public, category-specific price data for ERE-E. So don’t automatically assume the generally published market price applies exactly to ERE-E; ask your registration service provider about the actual realised sale price for electricity EREs.

What remains uncertain

A few points we can’t fill in with full certainty, despite checking official sources:

• Whether every registration service provider has equal experience processing ERE-E specifically, alongside the fuel categories.
• Whether a separate price level or a separate sub-obligation for ERE-E will emerge over time, apart from the fuel categories.
• Exactly how the sector and energy-type codes are combined and displayed in practice on statements or in individual providers’ portals.
• Whether future changes to the RED directive or the Energy for Transport Regulation will adjust this categorisation over time.

This article is general, factual explanation based on public sources and not tax or financial advice. If you’re unsure about your specific situation, check with your registration service provider or consult the official NEa documentation.