Romania is on its way to becoming a major hub for renewable energy production, thanks to a solid energy mix of seven energy sources (hydro, nuclear, natural gas, solar, wind, coal and biomass) that ensures the country’s energy security, said Cristian Dragomir, PMO / Bidding Manager at WALDEVAR Energy.

“In this context, Romania must focus on harmonising energy consumption with energy production and vice versa,” Dragomir said at the conference “Digitalization and Energy Efficiency – Oradea”, organised by Energynomics, together with the Italian Chamber of Commerce for Romania – CCIpR.

There are many energy efficiency and digitalization solutions that can contribute to this harmonization, and Dragomir is confident that renewable energy projects, including large-scale ones, will be realized with the support of banks and financial institutions.

For small energy efficiency projects, installing self-consumption capacity with or without grid injection is a distinct solution that offers significant energy efficiency. According to Dragomir, energy efficiency is not about reducing consumption, but about making efficient use of available energy.

“It is crucial to emphasise that energy efficiency is primarily about efficient energy consumption, not necessarily about reducing it. Photovoltaic panels are by far the simplest and cheapest form of energy efficiency,” he added.

Today, the balance of renewable energy prosumers and producers is perfectly balanced – 1.5 to 1.6 GW – in the context of historically negative prices. This shows that energy efficiency should include not only reducing consumption but also investing in energy production.

Dragomir said small local businesses should closely monitor their water, electricity and gas consumption, using big data gathering tools to draw informed conclusions and implement effective solutions based on “real data”.

WALDEVAR Energy currently has around 400 MW of renewable energy projects, of which 147 MW have recently been added to its portfolio, a sign that the large-scale renewable energy market is on an upward trend.

The conference “Digitalization and energy efficiency – Oradea” was organized by Energynomics with the support of the Italian Chamber of Commerce for Romania – CCIpR, and of our partners: ADC, BCR, Celestica, CRC Energy, Datacor, Fortza.ro, ICAP CRIF, Intesa Sanpaolo Bank, Photon Energy, Polytrade Global, Unicredit Bank, WALDEVAR Energy.