Gas in the future Energy Strategy of Romania

by Dumitru Chisalita

The Energy Strategy of Romania has been discussed a lot and for a long time. Companies waiting for it, blaming its absence for their inaction, companies indifferent to the future Energy Strategy and companies that don’t want an Energy Strategy for Romania. The qualitative analysis of the gas sector, as step in developing the Energy Strategy, was carried out on 11 March 2016 and was an action conducted in order to collect more opinions on the future of this sector. A commendable initiative of the Ministry of Energy to bring back in Romania the debate. The development of this action at the Polytechnic University and the quality of participants brought back in discussion realities neglected in the past 25 years, critics and ideas for the gas sector. However, I cannot help criticizing the fact that two of the largest companies in the gas sector did not participate to this event particularly important for the sector, for these companies, for their employees, but also for the city of Medias. Even if, together the only citizen of Medias who has ever held the position of Secretary of State in the gas sector, we tried to cover this situation, there’s still a bitter taste of lack of involvement of gas specialists in preparing their own future. An important conclusion drawn from discussions is the need to replace the “gas industry” with a “gas market”, replace the practice “we produce and then see what to do with gas” with “we create a functional market and produce as much as it requires”. A debate that strengthened the obligation to build a free, liquid, responsible, closely supervised gas market, developing ways to support vulnerable customers, uniquely dispatched to prevent crises, full integrated in the European Energy Union and promoting the sustainable development of gas resources. The need for all activities in the gas sector (design, construction, exploration, exploitation, services related to gas handling) must have a single purpose, of facilitating gas trading in order to obtain the best gas prices at a certain point and for a certain quality of delivery. The transaction must be the spearhead of all other activities: field exploration, gas extraction, development of a certain form of storage, design and construction of pipelines, exploration of objectives in the sector, dispatching, measurement, allocation etc. The success of the approach must be supported, the debates of ideas being necessary to continue through specific platforms, in order to collect ideas and suggestions, but also to measure the expectations from it.

Romanian version: http://dumitruchisalita.ro/2016/03/12/gazele-naturale-in-viitoarea-strategie-energetica-a-romaniei/

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