“We will introduce the obligation of natural gas producers to sell part of the production on the exchange, thus we can support price competitiveness and possibly decrease, given the supply and demand. We will also implement a new regulation, a new European Union guidebook, and cut by up to 85% the green certificates for major consumers, supporting the companies which create tens of thousands of jobs, which in fact represent the industry, to stay competitive and decrease their energy prices and costs,” Prime Minister Victor Ponta stated.
According to a government decision draft, the big electric power consumers will only pay 15-60% of the green certificates quota, in a state aid scheme meant to prevent the companies from losing their competitiveness due to the support granted to renewable energy.
“Beneficiaries will pay the following percentages of their mandatory green certificate quota, depending on how energy intensive they are: 15% in case of over 20% energy intensiveness, 40% for a 10%-20% energy intensiveness and 60% for a 5% to 10% energy intensiveness,” the government decision draft reads.
The support scheme will be available for 10 years and will come into force after approval from the European Commission.
The energy intensive industry in Romania accounts for about 20% of the final gross power consumption; it also creates the most jobs, having directly provided 760,000 jobs and about 1,500,000 indirectly in 2012.
Economy minister Constantin Nita saying in February that Romanian producers and distributors of natural gas could be forced by law to sell on the local commodities market 20% to 30% of the volumes produced or proposed for distribution.