CE Oltenia develops numerous new investments and plans to collaborate with other investors and financiers to achieve them, said Lăcrămioara Diaconu-Pințea, member of the Board of Directors of CE Oltenia, during the 7th edition of the Energy Strategy Summit, an event organized by Energynomics. CE Oltenia plans to invest in two new cogeneration plants (totaling 1,300 MW) and solar parks (700 MW) that require multi-annual investments.
“We had a series of dialogues to find partners, both for the sale of electricity and for partnerships, to invest together. The restructuring plan means many billions… Meanwhile, the (restructuring) cost has increased, due to the increase in the price of CO2 – now over 50 euro/t. The company cannot go to the state and ask for state aid for 100% of the restructuring cost. The solution we found, after discussions with representatives of the Romanian state and the European Commission, was to come up with these partnerships for new investments – and we are in the process of attracting these potential partners. We have invited over 40 companies to join us, we have already received expressions of interest for somewhere in the middle of this issue and we will continue discussions, trying to prove, until the European Commission takes a decision on the plan, that it can be supported by an integrated effort. In addition to investors, we also talk to banks. We have almost 10 Romanian and international banks that we have been talking to since the beginning of the year – again, it was a result of the dialogue with Brussels – we must have as many partners as possible involved in supporting these efforts,” said Lăcrămioara Diaconu-Pințea.
“Everything must be done in a very short time … for us, the biggest enemy is time,” she added.
At the same time, the restructuring process of CE Oltenia had to be drawn up in a record time.
“We started working on this plan last summer, we had six months. And in six months to work on a plan that actually radically changes a large part of the energy sector in Romania was not an easy mission. However, we drew up this plan, submitted it in Brussels, and from the discussions we had with the representatives of the European Commission, we understood that it is not just a matter of a restructuring plan in the classical sense, but a state aid of a very large magnitude, we were talking about 3.5 billion euro and five years of restructuring. At the same time, we are not only restructuring, but also investing. And, at the same time, we have a social impact. This restructuring plan is not just about Romania’s energy security – we have a 20% market share, it’s about people – how we take care of them – because there are three counties affected, as the activity of this company is gradually reduced, and it’s about investment – without which we can not talk about the coal phase-out, in fact. And this is not just the case in Romania. Wherever we go, we have to replace the coal with something else,” concluded Lăcrămioara Diaconu-Pințea.
