CEZ Romania is prepared to increase the annual level of investments in the energy distribution area to 7-800 million lei in order to cope with the pace imposed by the energy transition, but there is a risk of a shortage of equipment, said Ondrej Safar, country manager at CEZ Romania, at the 9th edition of the Energy Strategy Summit, an event organized by Energynomics.

“Starting next year, we believe it is necessary to raise the level of investments to 700-800 million lei per year, funds that will come from our own financing, bank loans and EU funds. (…) However, we see that there is also the huge risk of not having which companies to make these investments with, nor enough equipment,” said Safar.

He specified that these investments are necessary for the energy transition and are also useful for the final consumer, whose role will increase significantly in the new energy landscape.

On the generation side, the company is facing a decision regarding the renewable energy assets it owns. Most of these assets were built in Romania between 2010-2015 and their average operating period is 20 years. Thus, the question arises whether these assets will be able to be modernized or not. On the other hand, the technologies that exist now have a higher efficiency coefficient compared to those of 15-20 years ago.

The transition that the energy sector is going through now is a massive one that will consume huge funds, and in the end, this industry will be a decentralized and digitized one. However, there is a risk that not all the funds that will be allocated to this transformation will be used effectively.

“If we look at the transition targets for 2030, we might be spending a lot of money on some targets that are not necessarily future-oriented,” Safar warned.

At the same time, on the electricity distribution side, investments are made over long periods of time, 30-40 years, and for this segment, it is a regulated one, all these investments will later be found in the tariffs and prices paid by end consumers. For this reason, discussions with regulators regarding the future regulatory period are crucial.

Energy Strategy Summit 2023 was organised by Energynomics with the support of ABB, ASTRASUN Solar, BCR, CEZ Romania, Eaton Electric, Electrica Furnizare, Electro Service RB, Elektra Renewable Support, EnergoBit, Enevo Group, E.ON, Finder, Huawei, MET România Energy, OMV Petrom, OX2 România, Phoenix Contact, Photomate, ProCredit Bank, REI Grup, Renomia Gallagher, Romgaz, Schneider Electric, Signify, Transelectrica, Taw Energy, Volt, WIKA, Wiren, Alexandrion Group, Aqua Carpatica, Klarmedia and Mobexpert.