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ANP Seeks to Reorganize Its Agenda to Improve Natural Gas Regulation and Make Processes Clearer and More Efficient for the Market.
The regulation of natural gas in Brazil involves decades of challenges and transformations.
In fact, since the creation of the first Gas Law in 2009 until the implementation of the New Gas Law in 2021, the country has been trying to organize a sector essential for the economy and competitiveness.
However, despite advances, there are still regulatory gaps, especially in the transportation and distribution of piped gas.
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Law No. 11,909/2009 represented the first effort to regulate the natural gas sector in Brazil. Thus, the legislation created a regulatory framework to enable market expansion and increase competition.
However, its implementation faced numerous obstacles. Consequently, the ANP took more than ten years to finalize much of the regulation, and many processes remained incomplete.
Moreover, the lack of clear guidelines for midstream, that is, the transportation and processing of gas, hindered the development of the sector and made it difficult to create a competitive market.
The New Gas Law of 2021 represented another important step to modernize the sector. It, therefore, introduced more transparency, legal certainty, and incentives for private investment, especially in expanding the pipeline network and improving existing infrastructure.
However, four years after its enactment, the country still lacks consolidated definitions regarding the regulation of natural gas transportation and processing.
Thus, many complementary norms and public consultations are still awaiting decisions that guide the market in a clear and predictable manner.
Additionally, another historical factor delayed the sector’s development: the market concentration in the hands of Petrobras.
For decades, the company dominated the entire natural gas chain, from production to transportation, which hindered the entry of new private players.
On the other hand, the current regulation seeks to correct these imbalances, creating fairer conditions for all market participants.
The Current Challenge of ANP
The National Agency for Petroleum, Natural Gas, and Biofuels (ANP) faces, therefore, the challenge of reorganizing its regulatory agenda to make processes more efficient and understandable.
The appointment of Artur Watt Neto as Director-General and Pietro Mendes in Directorate 4 brought, thus, hope for greater consistency and strategic planning.
Thus, with the management team complete, the agency can rethink its procedures and promote a more structured regulation of natural gas.
One of the historical problems in the sector involves the overlap of public consultations and hearings. In just six months, the ANP launched various regulatory processes simultaneously, thereby creating a confusing environment for the market.
This overlap complicates, therefore, the participation of interested parties and increases the risk of poorly founded decisions, which may cause significant harm to piped gas users.
Additionally, the practice of releasing documents only partially, often with confidential information blocked, contributes to information asymmetry, undermining the transparency expected from a regulatory agency.
The transportation of natural gas in Brazil still suffers, in fact, from high tariffs and difficulties in infrastructure sharing.
Petrobras’ “legacy contracts,” which bind carriers to old rules, exemplify the complexity faced by the sector.
Only in August 2025, after persistent requests, the ANP released these contracts for public consultation, allowing the market to assess essential information for tariff reviews.
Before that, most documents were accessible only in parts, often with illegible excerpts, which prevented adequate analysis.
Furthermore, the absence of standardization among different contracts and practices adopted by transportation companies complicates interpretation by analysts, regulatory bodies, and investors.
Thus, this inconsistency can lead to divergent decisions on tariffs and investments, impacting the entire natural gas value chain. Therefore, the ANP needs to organize its agenda to reduce risks and create predictability.
Failures in Standardization and Technical Quality
Another relevant challenge of natural gas regulation involves the standardization of information. In fact, each company publishes data differently, making it difficult for regulatory bodies, investors, and other interested parties to understand.
This lack of uniformity increases, therefore, the risk of decisions based on incomplete information and undermines the effectiveness of regulatory policies.
The ANP also needs to improve the technical quality of the documents produced. Technical notes and Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) reports often arrive incomplete or poorly founded.
Thus, good regulatory practices require detailed analyses and clear justifications for each decision. In tariff processes, this includes presenting criteria, calculation bases, and methodologies transparently, allowing everyone to understand the economic and social impacts.
A recent example shows the problems of schedule and process overlap: Public Consultation 05/2025 reviews Resolution RANP-15 of 2014, which defines criteria for calculating gas transportation tariffs.
The deadline for contributions runs until September 2025, but the ANP simultaneously launched Public Consultation 08/2025, related to the tariff review of various carriers, with a public hearing scheduled for the same period.
Thus, the market needs to provide feedback on complex processes without security about which rule will prevail, increasing the risk of errors in contributions.
Additionally, often, the inquiries sent by agents receive responses directly from the companies, without critical analysis from the ANP. This practice highlights, therefore, the need for clear and impartial processes, ensuring that all contributions undergo consistent technical evaluation.
Paths to More Efficient Regulation
The regulation of natural gas requires planning and consistency. Therefore, the ANP needs to ensure that processes follow a logical sequence, with clear deadlines, standardized data, and wide availability of documents.
This includes not only the complete disclosure of information but also the adoption of consistent technical criteria for analysis and decision-making.
Thus, the participation of interested parties is only effective when there is clarity about the rules and the impacts of each measure.
The agency should also strengthen its critical evaluation capacity. Moreover, it needs to rigorously analyze proposals from carriers, planned investments and asset bases.
Without detailed review, tariffs can become misaligned and create market imbalances, harming the sector and the country’s competitiveness.
Another essential point is to increase interaction with industry agents. Public consultations and hearings only generate value if there is enough time for analysis and preparation of contributions.
Thus, establishing realistic schedules and avoiding overlaps ensures greater quality in regulatory decisions and increases market confidence.
Historically, Brazil has gradually advanced in the regulation of natural gas, but there is still much to be done.
In fact, creating a consistent, transparent, and predictable regulatory framework is essential to attract investments, expand the gas pipeline network, and improve the availability of piped gas for residential, commercial, and industrial consumers.
Therefore, the ANP has the opportunity to reorganize its agenda, prioritize strategic processes, and establish clear standards for participation and technical analysis.
Future of Natural Gas Regulation
The regulation of natural gas in Brazil still faces historical challenges, such as regulatory gaps, overlapping processes, and incomplete documentation.
Thus, the ANP can reorganize its agenda by adopting practices that promote efficiency, transparency, and technical consistency.
In this way, the market will be able to operate with greater security, benefiting the entire natural gas value chain and contributing to economic development.
Attention to transparency, standardization of information, and rigorous technical analysis will be crucial for the success of the sector’s regulation in the coming years.
Therefore, the expectation is that the agency implements structural changes that facilitate the participation of all stakeholders, promote predictability, and create a solid regulatory environment capable of supporting the growth of the natural gas market in Brazil.
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