Authorities should stop the program of free connection of Romanian consumers to the gas network, as this leads to higher prices for everyone, by socializing costs and increasing imports, said on Monday, Dumitru Chisăliță, president of the Intelligent Energy Association, in a meeting with the press.

“It is our country’s policy to connect 1.8 million consumers free of charge. Although I doubt they will want to consume gas at current prices, this will require 4 billion cubic meters per year, which will come from where? We should stop this program, which would mean that we need a lot of extra gas and increase the price of gas for everyone, because these connection costs are socialized for all consumers,” said Chisăliţă.

This is because, although the connection is free for those who connect to the network, the costs are initially paid by the distribution operator, then, according to the law, are recovered by the companies through the distribution tariffs that all gas consumers pay.

“Last year, according to the National Institute of Statistics, Romania imported 3.2 billion cubic meters of gas, or 29% of its consumption. This in the conditions in which Azomureş was closed and the winter was a mild one, otherwise the share of imports would have been even higher,” Chisăliţă also said, according to Agerpres.

He pointed out that there are several measures that Romania can take to halve the amount of imported gas.

“It’s about the exploitation of deposits that have not been connected to the transport network so far because the people who own the land have opposed it, so it is necessary to change the legislation in order not to end up in a situation where an old man opposes a pipe on his land because he doesn’t want to or because he wants a million euros or dollars. Secondly, the Black Sea gas fields could have been exploited since last year. Unfortunately, the project is dragging, dragging, dragging for reasons that are not of a technical nature and it is a shame to throw money at imports instead of using this gas,” added the AEI representative.

Chisăliţă also reminded that OMV Petrom has reduced its domestic gas production, which leads to an even bigger deficit on the domestic market.