The President of the Smart Energy Association, Dumitru Chisăliță, drew attention on Friday to the fact that a possible abolition of the Ministry of Energy would come at a time when, after 17 years, Romania has an Energy Strategy, and warned that such a decision seems to create joy for the “smart guys”, disturbed by what the ministry has done in the last year and a half.

“We are downright ridiculous, we had 10 years of the Ministry of Energy’s existence, without a National Energy Strategy to apply and now that we finally have a National Energy Strategy again after 17 years, we no longer have a Ministry of Energy to apply it. Gentlemen, you make ministries according to the needs of the people and the country, not according to the wishes of some and the annoyances of others. I would even see the Ministry of Energy naturally taking over some energy-related tasks currently carried out by other ministries: the energy efficiency of buildings from the Ministry of Development, everything related to fuels (stations, warehouses, etc.) from the Ministry of Transport, the development of funds for direct or indirect energy projects from the Ministry of European Funds, and even the development of the so-called environmental funds, which have an energy purpose, from the Ministry of Environment. The abolition of the Ministry of Energy seems to create joy for the “smart guys”, bothered by what what the Ministry of Energy has done in the last year and a half,” Dumitru Chisăliță emphasized in a statement.

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The Ministry of Energy was established in 2015 after the Energy Department operated within the Ministry of Economy since 2013, and until 2012 there was a Ministry of Economy that in fact mainly carried out economic coordination actions of energy companies, the cited source states.

He recalled that the establishment of a Ministry of Energy in 2015 came against the backdrop of the deregulation of gas and electricity prices and also had a very important role in reducing the pressures exerted by the industry, more precisely by large energy consumers, to obtain cheap electricity and gas. Thus, the risk of a conflict of interest between large consumers and large energy and gas producers, especially those with state shareholding, was reduced, the AEI representative believes.

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“An example was the fact that chemical fertilizer producers were putting pressure on the minister who represented both the industry and energy sectors. A return of energy to such a Ministry could reopen this illegal practice,” Chisăliță said, according to Agerpres.

He believes that, in the current context in which we no longer have an energy sector, but an energy market, the functioning of which is impetuously necessary to be based on public policies, the role of a Ministry of Energy is very great.

“To abolish the Ministry of Energy today, when we have reached the highest import quotas in Romania’s history, when we are in the midst of a complicated process of achieving the exploitation of Black Sea gas, when urgent action is needed to solve the systemic problems induced by the variability of sources and the volatility of energy consumption, when the gas and electricity market must be reliberalized, when steps must be prepared for the supply of energy and heat in the next 25 years, in the year in which we have faced huge prices on the electricity spot market, when we must also urgently initiate energy efficiency measures in Romania, when we have the challenge of eliminating bottlenecks and preparing the new technologies so necessary for Romania in the future – the production of energetic hydrogen, carbon storage, the CO2 capture and transport network, the adaptation of existing networks to green gases, energy storage, the exploitation of geothermal energy, etc.,” commented the AEI president.

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At the same time, Dumitru Chisăliță states that the abolition of the Ministry of Energy would go against the European trend. He pointed out that, given that the European Union is in full transition towards green energy and an economy with low carbon dioxide emissions, many countries have established the Ministry of Energy and Climate Change, while in other countries there is only the Ministry of Energy, as is the case here (in the USA there is an independent department of energy).

“Eliminating absolute poverty, stopping the poverty process and reducing it to an acceptable economic, social and political level, increasing the population’s well-being, access to education and healthcare, employment, increasing real incomes – all have a close connection with energy. All of this, in the absence of an issuer of specific and focused public policies, of an entity responsible for the energy sector, in the form of a Ministry, will further deepen the abyss of crises in Romania. Those who want to abolish the Ministry of Energy should remember: Energy is for humanity what blood is for the human body,” the AEI president also emphasized.