2024-04-26 22:02:06
The decision to postpone the liberalization of the electricity market for domestic consumers is a step in the right direction. This is what President Rumen Radev wrote on his Facebook profile.
“Why did it take MPs so long to do it? Why did they have to reject the veto I imposed on the changes to the Energy Act, which half a year ago could have stopped the proposed changes without clear mechanisms how to to compensate people and without any impact assessment.So today we saw where the impact is – on the street.
Policy and legislation should be made with concern and responsibility towards Bulgaria, and not under the pressure of protests due to the upcoming elections. The development of Bulgarian energy must not be based on spontaneous solutions, but on a clear strategy that preserves the autonomy and independence of our energy system and leads to predictability. Decisions about the future of energy are of key importance for the competitiveness of our economy and the well-being of Bulgarian citizens, and they can be guaranteed not with empty political promises, as we heard from the last regular government, but with clear calculations, mechanisms and strategy.
The old energy strategy expired already in 2019, and since no one took it upon themselves to make a new one, the caretaker government of Galab Donev developed a detailed and clear new document, as a proposal to all parliamentary groups and to the next regular government, but until a new strategy is adopted it never got there. The caretaker government left BGN 890,000,000 in the Power System Security Fund to support the Bulgarian energy industry if necessary, but there is still no clarity as to what happened to these funds.
Many of the strategic issues for the development of the energy sector in Europe also remain unresolved, and an example of this is the lack of clarity around the so-called Green Deal. While representing Bulgaria at the meetings of the European Council, I repeatedly defended the position that our country should not be pressured to hastily abandon basic capacities such as coal and nuclear energy, before affordable and effective solutions for storing energy from renewable energy sources are available. My position before the EU was to take into account the specifics of the countries when reducing carbon emissions, as well as to reduce their cost.
Dealing with these challenges and the effective protection of Bulgarian national interests requires systematic actions and that is why the presidential institution supports these fair demands of the trade union organizations to protect the autonomy of the Bulgarian energy industry and those working in this key sector for our country,” he also wrote.
The decision to postpone the liberalization of the electricity market for domestic consumers is a step in the right…
Posted by Rumen Radev on Thursday, April 25, 2024.