The Ministry of Energy has no interest in blocking Mindia, claims Virgil Popescu, the Minister of Energy, in a Facebook post.
“Mass Global Energy Rom, part of Mass Group Holding, is an important global energy producer that has capacities of over 8,500 MW and has pledged investments of 1 billion euros at Mintia,” writes Popescu.
“In 6 years, the Hunedoara Energy Complex has accumulated debts of 1.5 billion euros. When the PNL came to govern, it found the Complex with high debts. Moreover, the Mintia power plant operated without an environmental permit, and since entering insolvency in 2019 – including the period preceding the shutdown and the period of entry into conservation – it has produced another damage: 685 million lei. In addition, it was granted an illegal state aid of 390 million lei, which must be returned. All this determined the shutdown of the plant. To those who criticize the sale of Mintia today, I say one more thing: The last stage of modernization was in 2009, when 218 million lei were invested, an insignificant amount compared to the needs of the plant. Moreover, Romania is in a trial with the European Commission at the CJEU for Mintia and CET Govora precisely because they operated without an environmental authorization,” the minister claims.
He states that Mintia could no longer operate on coal, since “the four coal mines in Valea Jiului barely ensure (only 2 days a week) the operation of the Paroșeni plant”.
At the same time, the Ministry of Energy notified the judicial administrator that the future owner will have the obligation not to demolish the current thermal power plant until he builds something else instead. In the context of these requests, the one who purchased Mintia assumed the obligation to put into operation a new capacity of 1,290 MWh of installed power by 2026, of which at least 800 MWh is baseload/on gas and renewable energy. “Thus, by the deadline of 2026, we want to ensure that Mintia will use the gas extracted from the Black Sea.”
