The EU directive on the promotion of electricity produced from renewable energy sources (RES) has established reference targets for the share of RES electricity in each EU Member State's power supply. To reach this goal every EU country follows a different promotion strategy and some deployed instruments seem more successful in increasing the share of RES electricity than others. But we argue that there is no "natural" superiority of any instrument because the success depends on the respective framework conditions in the individual Member State on the one hand and the specific style of the used promotion models on the other. We conclude by identifying a number of success conditions for an increased use of RES: long-term planning security for investors, technology-specific remuneration for green power, strong efforts in the field of the power supply systems (grid extension, fair access to the grid, etc.) and measures to reduce local resistance against RES projects. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.