This is the transcript of the message sent by Toni Volpe, CEO Enel România, during the Energy Strategy Summit, held on June 4 at the Cantacuzino Palace from Bușteni.

Thank you for inviting me! I will say probably a few things that were already touched upon by Mr. Roberts before me, but I also wanted to start with an observation which is about the EU opportunity. Basically, the EU is always seen as follows: we need to comply to some new regulations that somebody in Brussels does and is not very often seen as an opportunity for the country to actually create for itself some sort of advantage or over other countries, because at the end of the day every country competes for capital these days. So, instead of doing a translation of an European direction that doesn’t provide any advantage, governments should rather try to focus on how do they interpret the EU directive in a way that it can provide such advantage.

Also thinking about what were the original goals I believe, of joining the EU, was to ensure economic development, but it was also about reducing electricity poverty, for example in our field, or maintaining electricity accessibility. These were, I believe, the original goals. These days I think it’s also about creating, introducing some level of competition for Romania, in the sense of having a stronger ability to create an industry that can provide development for the country, as well as being an industry that can be differentiated from other countries, so the electricity sector, in other words, should be a strategic lever for the country. Now, to do that, for sure it’s important to talk about the strategy and perhaps to even do it in the right terms.

As Mr. Roberts was pointing out, we need to be concrete, we need to be pragmatic, it is about choices and for sure it is about the government making choices, it is for sure about having a better consultation process. When I talk about consultation process, of course I talk about the true consultation process, where there is a real intention to listen to the various parties, in particular to listen to those actors that are global players, to those actors that can bring the experience, that they have matured in other markets and where maybe the same issues, the same challenges have already been solved.

I have to say that recently I have seen progress in this field, in the sense that I see a lot more attention to really listen to what the various actors have to propose, but I think there is also a responsibility that stands on the shoulders of the actors. In other words, it’s very easy to say we want to be listened, but also I think it’s the responsibility of these players to try and make proposals which are very concrete, very simple and at the end of the day, most of the cases, there are proposals which are not only self-interested, but are proposals that can bring win-win situations, as somebody before, the President of RWEA for example, was talking about before.

So, I think that’s what we need to do and that’s what we intend to do in a very pragmatic approach. For sure, for example, on the public authorities point, on the legislative process, I believe it’s much better sometimes to have quicker legislation, without waiting a lot of time to come up with the perfect solution, is better to fix certain things sometimes even small things, that do not work, which however can benefit the industry a great deal. So, faster solutions, sometimes less strategic, more pragmatic, smaller in extent, but faster. I believe sometimes is much better to take a solution and then correct it afterwards if it’s not perfect, rather than waiting for the perfect solution for many years.

Clearly this means that in addition to a consultative process, the public authorities need to take their own responsibility, in other words they need to make their own choices. To do that, however they also need to improve the competencies that they have, so they need to be able somehow to attract the right competencies or develop it. I will give you a practical example. There is a legislation for distributed generation, I believe that what is important is to stay in the 90 days, to actually have the concrete proposals, then start this process, rather than exceed 90 days and I think it is probably much better to start with something which is rather small, for example for a target of a few Megawatts and then a cup and then for example extended in the future observing how the development of this sector works. In other words, an approach where you incrementally can adjust the way you manage the process.

What I also think it’s important: is important to simplify and reduce the level of bureaucracy. So, I said before, more legislation, faster legislation, but also legislation that tends to simplify the bureaucratic approach which very often is still part of Romania. Again, in comment of solutions, gradual improvements are important, a good example of the electricity bill, we’ve been working quite a lot with ANRE, with the delivery unit of the government to simplify the bill, is not yet perfect, but I think it’s getting a lot better, what is important is to keep doing and to keep educating our consumers, which I think is one of the fundamental goals that all the players in the industry need to take care of.

I am very often amazed of how little our consumers know about the industry and I believe therefore the education is an important part. Being pragmatic, being fact based, means also overcoming some trade-offs that are only apparent or are no longer true and I’ll give an example: sometimes I encounter some thinking that believes that modernity is somehow too expensive for Romania, so for some reasons, strange reasons, Romania is not worth modernity. This is simply not true; I’ll give you an example. I mean, let’s take the connection of customers in remote areas, with new technology; with off grid solutions probably today you can have in some cases solutions which are a lot cheaper, even 50% cheaper than the traditional on grid solution, so a problem which in the past was very tough to solve, today with modern technologically advanced solutions can be solved probably in a much easier way, so this trade-off is simply non-existing.

As probably it does not exist, a trade-off in which modernity can only be seen by wealthy people or in the city, while the rural areas cannot see the modernity and the technology. I think that you know, to think differently about this is important. ENEL and I also know that other people today mentioned the digitalization is important for the future. We fully believe that there are good opportunities in Romania, very concrete about digitalization. We have, for example, in the distribution area the possibility to introduce digital meters, a pilot program this year, it’s important that we do not miss any more time. We continue in a very fast manner in the development of this project, but it’s not only about hard technology, it’s also about, for example, using digital technology to reach our customers.

Romania has a very strong IT&C platform and has already incredible good numbers. More than 10% of our customers, for example, interact with us only through digital means, through our web portal, through our application. We can further leverage on that and take advantage of one of the infrastructures that Romania has, for example and it’s intern can provide better consumer benefit, better quality of life and ultimately better choice.

Final point, another trade-off or another apparent trade-off that even today I believe came out, is that somehow the energy conversation, the energy dialogue is made by the bad guys and the good guys on different sides, fighting each other. I do not believe this is the correct approach, I believe that actually every player in the energy sector should sit around the table and have a constructive dialogue with the authorities and the government and try to explore solutions that can be beneficial for the industry and most importantly can be beneficial for the country.

This does not mean that there will not be choices which will not make some people unhappy, because at the end you cannot meet all goals as previously was said, but it is important that this attitude of apparent fight, of apparent separation between various factions of the industry is overcome, otherwise we keep talking about the generators versus the distributors, or the transporters, and we don’t try to address the issues of the country. So that’s what I wish to see if you want on the strategy, but also more practically in terms of the next steps and practical solutions.