Blog entry

The solution to Romania’s energy poverty is decentralised, renewable energy

Estimates show that in 2019, the number of people in Europe who faced difficulties meeting their minimum energy needs reached 31 million. Romania is no exception, with 32 to 45 per cent of the population affected by energy poverty, depending on the criteria used.

Energy poverty is a result of several factors – low incomes, low energy efficiency of residential buildings, high energy expenditures – and Romania’s current support measures have found it difficult to address the complexity of this phenomenon. In Romania, the measures and policies targeting vulnerable consumers have focused only on some of these factors, failing to address all aspects of energy vulnerability in an integrated way. As a result, energy poverty remains a major challenge for which the most appropriate levers have not yet been identified.

Romania benefits from considerable potential for the use of renewable energy sources, given the sunshine duration and wind speed, as well as from a wide range of energy efficiency interventions in the residential building sector. However, existing public policies fail to take advantage of these in order to reduce the energy vulnerability of the population.

A recent report from Bankwatch Romania, ‘Decentralised energy production, a solution to energy poverty’ (in Romanian), points out that energy poverty can be combatted through dedicated programmes that provide 100 per cent subsidies for the installation of photovoltaic panels, solar thermal panels or heat pumps. These technologies can turn vulnerable consumers into prosumers and significantly contribute to reducing the price of bills. In addition, with improvements to the energy efficiency of homes and the replacement of old electronics with new, energy-efficient ones, vulnerable consumers will benefit from a reduction in energy consumption, and an increase in comfort and quality of life.

According to the analysis, the government programmes launched so far have not directly targeted vulnerable consumers, and many of the programmes have failed or lacked continuity. Most of the measures consist of financial aid, which involves subsidising the prices of fuels already used, mostly wood, gas, and coal. These types of programmes do not address the cause of the problem, but only its effects.

Furthermore, the programmes struggle to identify how many people might benefit from them. They identify different numbers of beneficiaries, between 500 thousand and 1.5 million, and yet the real number of people in Romania affected by energy poverty is still unknown.

The only programme that addresses local energy production was launched in 2019 by the Ministry of Environment, and it financed the installation of photovoltaic panels for approximately 800 isolated households. This was a one-time programme. Similar programmes, which identified 98,000 households not connected to the grid, were planned to be launched in 2007 and 2021 but were not successful due to administrative problems such as late approval of implementation regulations, non-budgetary allocations or lack of necessary funds. In comparison, the Light for Romania programme, launched in 2013 by a civil society organisation, consisted of installing photovoltaic panels on households not connected to the electricity grid and reached over 1,000 beneficiaries.

To date, there have been no specific measures to increase the energy efficiency of vulnerable people.

In this context, the report provides several recommendations to increase the electrification of homes and reduce energy poverty:

Strengthen existing databases on vulnerable consumers and the population affected by energy poverty
Reform the legislative framework to capitalise on the potential of energy communities and lead to the development of the prosumer sector among vulnerable consumers
Introduce investment priorities addressed to vulnerable consumers in the 2021 to 2027 operational programmes
Reconfigure existing programmes funded by the Environment Fund or develop new initiatives for the installation of renewable technologies in households that cannot meet their minimum energy needs
Create programmes to increase the energy efficiency of residential buildings specifically for citizens living in energy poverty
Improve the capacity of local authorities to attract the funds needed to increase the energy efficiency of housing and to implement green alternatives for energy production for vulnerable consumers

Sustainable heating is already reality in the EU. Now it’s the Western Balkans’ turn

After a winter marred by hiking gas prices and against the backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, now redrawing the European energy map, Western Balkan government need to take special note. In fact, if there were ever an ideal moment for policymakers in the region to step up the transition to sustainable heating systems, then that moment is now.

Unfortunately, some governments are using this crisis to weaken their own climate obligations. This includes illegally prolonging the operation of coal-fired power plants such as the Kakanj 5 and Tuzla 4 plants in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) – or trying to create new opportunities for coalprofitsby opening new export-oriented coal mines, like Mataruge and Glisnica in Pljevlja, Montenegro.

In other cases, however, state authorities are taking their first steps towards modern heating infrastructure based on renewables; geothermal heating in Sarajevo (BiH), solar thermal heating with seasonal storage in Novi Sad (Serbia) and heat pumps based on waste heat from utilities in Valjevo and Kruševac (Serbia) are just a few examples.

For Western Balkans, heating needs to be the next hot thing

One thing is for sure: the decarbonisation of the heating sector in the Western Balkans must dramatically accelerate. Coal will be phased out over the next 15 years and, so far, renewables comprise just 0.4 per cent of the region’s heating energy mix.

Planning and implementing clean heating requires significant investment and is a long-term process. It takes a well-developed policy and legal framework and strong municipal-level action coupled with support from local communities. It also requires the capacity to make use of all available financing mechanisms, including funds from the EU, Western Balkans Investment Framework, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and other international financial institutions. 

Renewables-based heating systems keep Denmark’s hygge

Thankfully, we don’t have to look far to find proven examples of functional, heating systems that combine low-temperature technologies and energy efficiency measures and rely on various renewable sources. Plenty of EU countries have been implementing these systems for 20 years or more.

For example, solar heating has in recent years made great progress in Denmark’s district heating systems, and the country has the highest number of such heating plants, as well as the biggest plants in the world.

In 2014, the city of Marstal, o n the island of Ærø reached 100 per cent renewable heating by integrating large-scale heat storage into the production system, which balances energy loads from several renewable sources, including half of the island’s solar thermal plant. This project required an investment of just EUR 15 million, EUR 6 million of which came from EU funds, and today, it produces heat at the cost of EUR 55 per megawatt hour (MWh), half as much as consumers elsewhere pay for heating from gas-based systems.

Moreover, the solar technologies implemented in Denmark are not only free from the choking air pollution heating systems based on fossil fuels often generate, they also come with trouble-free operations and negligibly low maintenance costs. For all these reasons, Denmark’s solar plants have proven to be very reliable over the past 25 to 30 years.  

One of the key milestones in the quest to achieve high production efficiency, energy stability and a significant decrease in CO2 emissions will be the integration of highly efficient technologies that enhance the use of local renewables like solar and geothermal energy. These technologies include heat pumps, heat recovery from existing industrial buildings or data centres, and heat storage. Heat pumps turn 1 kilowatt hour (KWh) of energy into 3 to 6 KWh of heat, making them five times more efficient than gas boilers (0.9 KWh). This is why the EU heat pump market is expanding rapidly, with around 1.8 million new pumps set up and 12 per cent annual average growth since 2015. Sweden and Germany are the European leaders in ground-source heat pump usage, while in Vienna, one of Europe’s largest heat pump plants supplies the equivalent of 25,000 households using waste heat and ambient heat from the Danube Canal.

Key role for heat pumps

To achieve decarbonisation targets in the district heating sector and net zero emissions by 2050, we simply have to install more heat pumps. However, to meet countries’ energy needs, and rapidly scale- up the deployment of heat pumps in the Western Balkans, governments should put the right policies in place – from financial incentives that offset the high upfront prices to programmes that train skilled professionals to clear permitting framework.

The EU’s heat pumps industry claims that it is ready for more than 50 million heat pumps to be fitted in households across Europe by 2030 and with the potential for up to 20 per cent growth per year. Yet, national policies need to address barriers to this goal, including high upfront purchase prices, operational costs, and the legacy of the existing building stock. One way to incentivise the uptake of heat pumps would be to exclude gas boilers and fossil gas blending heaters from national and EU public financing and redirect operational funds towards subsidies for heat pumps and related technologies.

Since 2015, subsidies have proven effective at offsetting the upfront cost of heat pumps and initiating market dynamics that accelerate their uptake in newly constructed buildings. The United Kingdom, which aims to deploy 600,000 heat pumps by 2028, will rely on grants and fiscal incentives to promote their use, while the Canadian province of British Columbia is offering no-interest loans to replace fossil fuel boilers with heat pumps.

Time to kickstart the decarbonisation of the heating sector

Western Balkan countries have taken some modest steps towards the implementation of sustainable district heating solutions, but some cities throughout the region such as Tuzla, Pljevlja, Sarajevo, Kostolac, Obrenovac, Pristina and Bitola – remain dependent on coal and gas for heating and power that generate toxic air pollution.

Phasing out fossil fuels in heating systems is not just about energy security and affordable energy sources; it’s also the best way to dramatically reduce CO2 emissions in the heating sector, which account for half of total emissions in Western Balkan countries. Governments need to take a progressive approach to transforming their heating systems through the integration of renewable solutions and ambitious energy-efficiency measures – and they need to start now. Thankfully, a proven blueprint for this transition already exists, and it can simply be copy-pasted to the Wester Balkans.

A step in the right direction: Bulgaria’s recovery plan improved after lengthy negotiations

After one year of negotiations, at the beginning of April, the European Commission finally endorsed the sixth and final version of Bulgaria’s recovery plan. According to the Commission, nearly 60 per cent of the projects included in the plan support the green transition of the country, which is the highest percentage among all the recovery plans approved so far.

This is an acknowledgement of the good work of the green civil society sector in the country. In the previous one and a half years, numerous comments and recommendations for improvements were made on all interim versions of the document and project plans. The money that the recovery plan will distribute amounts to 10 per cent of Bulgaria’s GDP, and it was extremely important that potentially corrupt projects and practices not be allowed to creep in.

The biodiversity perspective

The biodiversity component is a small but very strategic part of the recovery plan. Bulgaria will take action on setting conservation objectives and measures for Natura 2000 sites, as well as on forest and freshwater ecosystems, improving connectivity within and between Natura 2000 sites, and habitat restoration in line with the EU’s Biodiversity Strategy 2030 objectives. The biodiversity component of the plan amounts to EUR 47.5 million, which is a good sign of the rising importance of nature protection as a part of the Green Deal efforts of the country. However, the component still amounts to less than 1 per cent of the total budget of the plan.

The most positive development in the final version is that, thanks to the involvement of civil society organisations, the irrigation project that we opposed in the past has finally been excluded from the list of measures. The plan also includes a project dedicated to digitalisation of the complex management, control and efficient use of water, which is a long-awaited measure. Finally, the low-carbon economy component has been planned more strategically, and includes investment in grids, energy efficiency and the development of renewable energy sources.

As always, there are things that could have been improved further. For example, the large, newly revealed project for the installation of a minimum of 1.4 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy sources and batteries lacks biodiversity safeguards.

Building renovation and energy efficiency

The fact that the plan addresses energy efficiency with a significant amount of money is a good sign, considering that this topic has repeatedly been overlooked as a key tool in the energy transition. There is indeed a huge untapped potential for limiting, and gradually eliminating, foreign energy dependencies.

However, the EUR 610 million allocated for building renovation covers only 5 per cent of existing multifamily buildings. So far, only 2,000 have been renovated, using EUR 1 billion from the national budget. More than EUR 25 billion will be needed to renovate all the multi-family buildings that have not been covered by the programmes. At the current pace of building refurbishment, we will need at least 200 years to complete this task. Single-family buildings will remain excluded from the scheme, so that leaves out a large number of people living in rural areas who are affected by energy poverty.

Therefore, investments in energy efficiency need to be substantially increased. The support scheme should be changed to deliver more quality results and a more efficient use of public resources. So far, the current programme provides 100 per cent grant financing without any owner participation. The recovery plan envisages decreasing percentage of co-financing, with 80 per cent financing for those who apply starting in April 2023. It will bring some improvements in mobilising private capital and also an incentive for beneficiaries to control the quality of the renovation works. Further steps will be needed to design the financial measures such that they cover more buildings and to diversify support based on the quality of renovation as well as income levels.

Energy production

The biggest improvement to the plan – for which we give credit to the Bulgarian government – is the increase in the installation of new renewable energy sources capacity at an accelerated pace, together with cancelling support for gas turbines that were supposed to replace coal at one of the country’s power plants.

The Bulgarian’s recovery plan will support investments for the production of at least 1.4 GW from renewable energy sources. This measure will be implemented on the basis of five tender procedures every six months (starting in the third quarter of 2022), each of which will aim to build a minimum capacity of 285 megawatts (MW) of installed capacity from renewable energy sources. However, the requirement of 285 MW of minimum capacity gives an unparalleled advantage to large companies and deprives small companies of the possibility to participate in tenders.

The plan also includes a surprise measure to increase the flexibility of the energy system, with an ambitious 6 gigawatt hour (GWh) battery project. This will practically double the network balancing capacity of Bulgaria, with the introduction of a new technology that has the advantage of being able to be charged and discharged at the same time. Although this is a good idea, the process chosen to run the project raises questions. It is obvious that there is a plan to attract battery production capacity to Bulgaria. But the fact that the government has decided to structure a state-owned enterprise instead of pursuing a public-private partnership, or allowing for the participation of small companies, reinforces the doubt that this project has been proposed for the benefit of a specific owner of a battery company.

Some of the important reforms set out in the plan relate to the management of state energy and the introduction of a 40 per cent reduction in greenhouse gases by 2025 compared to their levels in 2019, the completion of the liberalisation of the electricity market, and the closure of coal-fired power plants by 2038. We will see how they will develop.

Although the plan was changed several times, and the most obvious measures prone to misuse of funds were removed after the continuous insistence of the civil society sector, a few controversial projects are still included.

For this reason, civil society has proposed to establish an independent monitoring committee that would serve as a supervisory authority on the goals, targets, planned reforms and timelines stated in Bulgaria’s recovery plan. An independent monitoring committee is a must in any democratic country, and we hope that this idea will be adopted soon.

Energy crunch or climate crisis, for CEE policymakers fossil gas is king

Despite efforts to reduce the EU’s dependence on Russian fossil fuel imports since the 2009 Russia-Ukraine gas dispute, the reliance of EU countries on Russian gas supplies has only increased – from 25% of total gas demand in 2009 to 32% in 2021. And the current war in Ukraine brings this dependence into sharp relief.

The period prior to the Russian invasion into Ukraine saw record-breaking surge in energy prices, in most part due to the increase in fossil gas prices. In the past months, both Russia and EU member states threatened to cut flows of Russian gas into Europe. Just last week, the European Parliament demanded a full embargo on Russian imports of oil, coal, nuclear fuel and gas and some EU governments made similar announcements or already followed on them.

Evidently, this is not only an issue of EU energy security and energy prices that accompany the fossil fuels import dependence. Russia’s fossil fuel exports are financing Putin’s war machine in Ukraine. According to Europe Beyond Coal’s online tracker, nearly two months since the war broke, EU member states have been spending over EUR 33 billion on Russian fossil fuels. The EU has paid Moscow nearly EUR 21 billion just for fossil gas imports.

Compared to western Europe, the reliance on Russian fossil energy imports is even greater in central and eastern Europe (CEE), as some countries are almost completely dependent on Russian fossil gas imports to satisfy their energy demand. At the same time, CEE governments are also the ones spearheading the EU discussion on stopping Russian fossil fuel imports.

The Baltic states and Poland have been the most vocal about the need to end Russian fossil fuels imports, and they are also the ones following on their statements in this regard. Lithuania was the first EU country to almost completely halt Russian gas imports. Similar claims are made for Latvia and Estonia, while Poland already announced it won’t renew its long-term fossil gas contract with Russia’s Gazprom that is ending in December this year.

Despite these bold steps, these governments’ perspective and plans concerning possible solutions to the energy crisis and potential alternatives to Russian fossil gas imports are worrying.

Bankwatch has analysed the announcements governments in Bulgaria, Czechia, Estonia, Hungary, Poland and Romania have made on their plans to transition away from Russian fossil fuels, and most are based on the idea that Russian fossil gas can only be replaced with other fossil gas imports. In some cases, governments look to prolong coal dependence or add nuclear to the country’s energy mix. None of these governments is even willing to consider systemic changes to our energy needs that had been desperately needed even before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

In fact, even when energy security is ostensibly guiding policymakers’ decision, the discussions in CEE countries appears to overlook the fact that the existing concept of EU energy security is essentially based on dependencies on foreign imports, often from undemocratic regimes. The need for a step increase in the expansion of renewables is only partially addressed in these governments’ announcements, while energy efficiency measures are not considered an important part of solution.

Some actions these governments now take as a response to the threat to energy security threat risk locking the region into fossil gas dependencies for the next 20-30 years due to nature of such contracts and the situation on the global fossil gas markets as most of the current fossil gas trade is locked into long term contracts. Exporters are looking to secure long term contracts before increasing their production to ensure the financial viability of their projects.

In Bulgaria and Czechia, entrenching obsolete energy sources

Bulgaria is totally dependent on Russia for gas supplies and the government announced it would not place sanctions or stop the purchase of Russian gas simply because it has no alternatives. However, Sofia has now accelerated projects such as the Gas Interconnector Greece – Bulgaria that will allow it to access Azeri gas through the Trans Adriatic Pipeline and it has also been negotiating new LNG import agreements with the United States.

The Bulgarian government has committed to use EU recovery funds for tripling renewable power generation, battery storage for flexibility of the system and renovation of buildings. At the same time Bulgaria is eyeing to fastrack plans to build a new nuclear reactor at the Kozloduy nuclear power plant. Government has revealed that Greece is interested in buying electricity from a future new nuclear power plant in Bulgaria.

Czechia has been a bit more ambitious in its response to the energy crisis as it seems that at least part of the government’s narrative has centered on investments in renewables and energy efficiency coupled with expedited roll out of heat pumps. However, diversification of gas suppliers is still viewed as key to energy security in Czechia and there were some statements from the government that it’s considering acquiring a stake in an LNG terminal in one of the neighboring countries. In a long-term perspective, Prague still portrays nuclear energy as the backbone of the country’s energy mix. In addition, the Czech government decided to pull out from its proposal to use EU funds for the installation of fossil gas boilers.

LNG ambitions in Estonia

In Estonia, much of the conversation since the invasion concentrated on the government’s formal intention to purchase or charter a floating LNG terminal. Once the site of an onshore LNG terminal planned to be built by a private investor, Paldiski is now set to host an offshore LNG facility enabled with public money.

Earlier, the European Commission had rejected Estonian proposals to include plans for an LNG terminal in the list of so-called EU Projects of Common Interest. If approved, such status would allow privileged access to EU public funds and fast permitting. But the Commission argued the existing LNG terminal in Klaipeda, Lithuania, had the capacity to serve all Baltic states but had been underutilized.

According to the Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs, a new LNG terminal could be up and running by the end of 2022 and could carry a EUR 500 million price tag. Due to relatively small gas demand in Estonia, the government depicts it as a joint project with Latvia and Finland, both of whom have higher demand for gas and are also very reliant on Russia.

The only other energy investment that Tallinn has publicly announced is using the supplementary state budget to connect renewable energy micro-producers to the national electricity grid. In the meantime, the Estonian forestry industry has playing up the prospects of substituting Russian gas with biomass in district heating systems. Yet, Estonia already sees excessive levels of clearcutting as a result of high export volumes of forest biomass to western Europe.

Hungary and Poland: A Russian gas dove and a Russian gas hawk

Although nearly 90 percent of the fossil gas imported into Hungary comes from Russia, the government has not made any announcements in recent months as to how it plans to decrease the country’s dependence on Russian gas. Rather, it has just signed a new long-term gas import contract with Moscow. .

Gas prices for households are fixed and the government is committed to keep this measure for as long as possible. Due to the national elections that took place in early April, most of the government energy-related messaging was focusing potential voters. In late March, Prime Minister Orban announced plans to transform the national electricity production over the next decade to centre on nuclear and solar. Although there was some change of heart in Orban’s perspective on the EU’s approach to Russia following a landslide electoral win, Hungary did support the European Council’s March declaration on ending the EU’s dependence on Russian gas, oil and coal as quickly as possible. But what this will practically mean when the new government updates its decarbonisation policy, strategies and plans for 2030 remains unclear.

In late March, the Polish government announced it will embark on “de-russification” of the its energy policy, in a bid to cease Russian energy imports by 2023. Long term contracts with Gazprom will not be renewed.

Warsaw plans to replace Russian gas with imports from other countries. With an annual capacity of 10 billion cubic meters, comparable to amounts currently imported under the current Gazprom deal, Baltic Pipe would make Norway Poland’s main gas supplier once completed.

Another point in Poland’s diversification plan is liquified fossil gas brought in through the terminal in Świnoujście, currently being expanded, and a new offshore LNG installation in Gdańsk.

Although no concrete regulations have been tabled yet, the Polish government’s narrative already contains numerous false solutions and lacks important elements. A pillar of the state’s energy sovereignty should now become nuclear power. Also, the government intends to maintain coal units for an unspecified period of time.

That said, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki’s cabinet has recently been highlighting renewables development, for the first time naming renewable energy a key to the country’s energy independence. Though, it is yet to announce any reforms that would waive limitations to renewables development.

Not least worrying, energy efficiency has been entirely absent from the government’s narrative and no more ambitious goals in energy savings, building renovation are expected.

Romania: Black Sea (g)aspirations

Although Romania imports only 10-15 percent of its gas demand from Russia, the government appears keen to diversify its gas imports. It has also endorsed a proposal that includes the transport infrastructure offered by the Romania-Bulgaria Interconnector and the BRUA gas pipeline in plans to extend the Southern Gas Corridor to the Balkans and central Europe.

Bucharest is also looking into the possibility of reserving capacity in LNG terminals in Greece and Croatia, and has already held talks with Qatar about a potential gas import deal.

Prospects for domestic gas also features high on the agenda. Romanian decision makers have been pushing to revise the offshore law and introduce better fiscal regulations for companies wishing to invest in the Neptun Deep perimeter and start exploitation in the Black Sea which holds around 200 billion cubic meters of gas. Private oil and gas firm OMV Petrom and state-owned Romgaz are awaiting the offshore law revision to make investment decisions they expect by next year at the latest.

Romania also looks to the U.S. for energy cooperation, and government representatives have recently met with the Department of Energy’s David M. Turk to discuss both the development of Romania’s civil nuclear programme and the diversification of fossil gas supply sources.

There has also been much talk about hydrogen investments, and specifically distribution infrastructure including at least 1870 km of pipelines for the distribution of blended fossil gas with hydrogen in the Oltenia region that is proposed to be financed with the EU recovery funds.

How to win energy sovereignty and avoid a gas trap in Poland

The European Commission introduced the REPowerEU communication, outlining an action plan to make Europe independent from Russian fossil fuels well before 2030, starting with gas. Poland, which is highly dependent on Russian fossil fuels imports, is also looking for a quick alternative. The Polish government announced the amendments to the obsolete energy strategy, the Polish Energy Policy by 2040 (PEP 2040). Their main goal: reducing dependency on fossil fuels from Russia in Poland’s energy policy. Sounds solid, but the devil is in the details.

Reasonable solutions and dead ends

The good news is that Minister of Climate and Environment, Anna Moskwa, told the media that power from renewables will be increased to 50 gigawatts during this decade. And by 2040, we will be producing half of our energy from renewable energy sources (RES). It is a significant shift in the Polish energy policy. This is three times more than the current potential of renewable energy and over 12 gigawatts more than the current power from coal and gas-fueled plants. But to achieve that, we need fewer words and more action.

For a long time, the government has been suspending the development of new onshore wind farm projects – currently the cheapest source of electricity. It resulted in delaying the submission of a draft act aimed at amending the wind energy planning regulation. This regulation sets a radius of ten times the height of the windmill that should be maintained between a wind turbine and the closest residential buildings.

This rule excludes 99.7 per cent of the Polish territory from building new onshore wind farms.

Another problem that may stand in the way of the dynamic development of domestic renewable energy potential, is the insufficient capacity of the energy network when it comes to accepting growing volumes of energy from renewable sources. Therefore urgent investment is needed to make the grid fit-for-purpose in an increasingly decarbonised, decentralised and digitalised power system.

Prime Minister Morawiecki told journalists that he does not want to pay for the expensive Norwegian gas as a substitute for costly Russian gas. We need to replace it with renewable energy sources in the long run. But again, the government plans to spend a big chunk of cohesion funds and recovery plan money on massive gas and roads investments. Around EUR 1.77 billion is allocated for investments related to natural gas under the largest infrastructure, climate and environment programme (FEnIKS).

Poland’s recovery plan is still under risk of rejection due to the rule of law dispute with the EU. In the last available version from almost a year ago, i.e. 30 April 2021, the specific amount earmarked for fossil gas is impossible to determine. However, the draft of the plan suggests that it will dominate investments in district heating and replacement heat sources in residential buildings.

And last but not least, EUR 4.5 billion is allocated under the FEnIKS programme for roads. This will contribute to the increasing dependency on Russian fossil fuels given that 70 per cent of the fuel used in vehicles on Polish roads comes from Russia. Currently, the FEnIKS earmarks only EUR 599 million for renewable energy investments – ten times less than roads and natural gas.

Missing elements

Instead of these measures that will further lock Poland into fossil fuels dependance, we need thought-out and systemic investments in renewable energy sources, modern distribution networks and new energy storage facilities.

There are still no renewable energy-based energy communities in Poland that are more resilient and flexible than a centralised energy system in a crisis or war. They would be a great addition to Polish energy security, but our law still blocks their development, despite the EU law requirements.

But most of all, we need to reduce the amount of energy consumed. Poland’s crucial problem is energy inefficiency. We need investments in energy savings and increased energy efficiency, including massive renovations of buildings, as well as we need investments in clean transport, circular economy and decarbonisation of industry.

Democracy first

Nearly sixty Polish civil society organisations concerned with state’s dependence on Russian fuels, wrote a statement and requested that the Polish government and the European Commission direct EU funds into a green transition in Poland. The stream of European money has to be channelled in the right direction, to redirect sources from gas and road construction.

We have received EUR 140 billion funds for Poland in recovery and cohesion funds along with the Modernisation Fund. According to the European Commission, over thirty per cent should go to climate action. This time, climate action is tightly connected to gaining energy security and sustainability from Russian gas.

Although we do not have the benefit of time, we should not forget about democracy and transparency.

Green transformation must be inclusive and participatory.

Meanwhile, the new implementation law (regulating spending of cohesion and recovery funds) introduced by the government sets new rules for monitoring committees, effectively blocking independent civil society organisations from overseeing the implementation and monitoring of these EU funds. The increased risk of corruption and particular political interests may derail the green transformation efforts due to the lack of that independent scrutiny.

North Macedonia’s Go-Slow on Greener Energy is Costing Lives

Forty years have passed since the first unit of the Bitola coal-fired power plant was put into operation in what is now North Macedonia.

One of two such plants in the country, they have provided 50 to 70 per cent of its electricity production over these years.

But, alongside generating electricity, the Bitola power plant has also been generating air pollution on a scale rarely seen in Europe.

Evidence of the detrimental impact of the dirty air on the environment and public health has been piling up for a decade.

The latest analysis, compiled by Bankwatch, released this week, shows that fine dust, PM2.5, concentrations alone are responsible for up to 8.43 per cent of all deaths among adults in the nearby village of Novaci.

This means that in this small, sparsely populated municipality, up to 6 people die prematurely every year due to PM2.5 pollution.

Dust and sulphur dioxide emissions from the power plant are consistently higher than emissions’ legal limits.

In the past few years, the plant has frequently been ranked among Europe’s top five emitters of pollutants.

In addition, coal ash, a by-product of the electricity production process, is deposited in the open near the plant, and was found to contain heavy metals whose radioactive levels also exceed allowed limits.

Locals have voiced concern many times. In 2014 and 2015, the town of Bitola saw thousands of protesters taking to the streets to demand cleaner air.

NGOs working on health issues publish alarming figures about the number of pollution-related diseases in the region, and citizens and businesses are coming together to install air-quality sensors.

The findings of the latest report are based on Bankwatch’s own measurements over nine months in 2021, and the data confirm that the coal power plant, the ash disposal site and the open-cast lignite mine, which are all operating without environmental permits of any kind, are the main sources of air pollution.

Worryingly, few days went by during the whole monitoring period when the pollution did not exceed the World Health Organisation’s recommended limits for ambient air quality.

In other words, people in Novaci are exposed to dangerous levels of air pollution throughout most of the year.

Novaci is not an isolated case. Almost all countries in the Western Balkans face the same issue of coal power plants poisoning the air.

The report “Comply or Close”, released by Bankwatch and CREA in September 2021, revealed that the addiction to coal in the Western Balkans was responsible for nearly 19,000 premature deaths in the region and beyond.

All five Western Balkan countries that have coal power plants are under infringement procedures initiated by the Energy Community Secretariat for not complying with emission limits.

Yet, in spite of this dire situation, governments in the region have done little even to monitor air quality and provide regular and real-time information to citizens in the coal regions, let alone implement measures that would bring down levels of pollution.

The time for coal-generated electricity is over. In its latest energy strategy, North Macedonia’s government set 2027 as the date for a coal phase-out – but this ambition needs to be translated into action.

Planning for a transition for the Bitola region is long overdue, and investments in energy transformation can no longer be delayed.

If the country is to follow its own government strategy, all these processes have to speed up.

Meanwhile, it is unacceptable for the authorities to avoid investing in pollution control for the REK Bitola mining and energy complex until it is closed.

Five more years – at least – of constantly living in an environment as polluted as Novaci’s will cost many more lives.

This article was first published on balkaninsight.com.

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