Radio România Internațional

Tag: heating

  • Winter heating in Romania

    Winter heating in Romania

    The energy minister, Sebastian Burduja, has given assurances that Romania’s gas deposits are full to the brim and the country will be able to get through the winter season without resorting to imports. He has added that Romania does not import Russian gas at all, and when needed, the country turns to Turkey and Azerbaijan. In fact, Romania follows the trend of the entire European Union. A European Commission report has recently showed that the EU’s dependence on Russian gas fell from 45% in 2021 to just 15% in 2023. And the downward trend in this dependence continued throughout this year.

     

    As for the situation in the country, Sebastian Burduja explained, for Radio Romania: “Today we have 3.280 billion cubic meters of gas stored in our gas storage facilities. That means a 103.29% degree of filling. We therefore have all the necessary capacity to be able to get through the winter season without resorting to imported gas. Even in the event of a harsher winter, I am convinced that we are ready to have enough gas and supply it to the Romanians”.

     

    The minister has also said that people who have difficulties in paying bills will continue to be protected. ‘Romanians should not be affected this winter either by the fear of bills, or the cold, or the temperature. They will benefit from gas supply, and the bills will continue to be capped, exactly as they were last winter’ the minister added.

     

    In this context, the Intelligent Energy Association (AEI) launched on Wednesday, in partnership with the Energy Ministry, the second edition of the “Houses with Heat” project, through which it aims to distribute firewood needed to heat homes in winter for families in difficulty. 3.5 million households in Romania are heated with wood. 80,000 are only in Bucharest and in the neighboring county of Ilfov, and over 7,000 are inhabited by vulnerable families, according to the data of the “Registry of Heat-Free Houses”, drafted by the Intelligent Energy Association.

     

    Adrian Halpert, director general at the Red Cross, believes that this program is even more important as the prices of energy and energy resources have continued to rise: “Energy comfort should not be a luxury for anyone. A minimum of energy comfort is a basic issue, which we must all have, and, after all, if you don’t have it, it affects human dignity. Energy prices continued to rise also for energy resources, such as wood. I hope to reach several thousand families this winter”.

     

    According to official statistics, 39% of Romanians are in the energy poor category. The authorities assure that, even after April 1, 2025, until the prices of natural gas and electricity are capped, they will take support measures for vulnerable people. (LS)

  • February 19, 2021 UPDATE

    February 19, 2021 UPDATE

    COVID-19 Romania reported 2,712 new SARS-CoV-2 cases in the last 24 hours, and 79 COVID-19 related deaths. Nearly 950 patients are in intensive care. The immunisation programme continues, at a rate of 40,000 vaccine doses daily. According to the National Vaccination Coordination Committee, the total number of doses used stands at roughly 1.3 million, with over 750,000 people immunised since the start of the campaign on 27th December.



    AID The Republic of Moldova Friday received humanitarian aid from Romania, consisting in medical equipment and personal protection equipment to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the Moldovan Presidency, the donation is worth around 2.3 million euro. The official reception ceremony was attended by Moldovas president Maia Sandu, interim PM Aureliu Ciocoi, the Romanian foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu and other officials. The EU Ambassador to the Republic of Moldova, Peter Michalko, emphasised that Bucharests help is vital.



    BUDGET The Supreme Defence Council convening in Bucharest today in a meeting chaired by president Klaus Iohannis approved the draft 2021 budgets for national security institutions. In order to pass the state budget, the government needed a decision from the Supreme Defence Council with respect to the budget of relevant institutions. Also on Friday the Cabinet held a meeting to approve the state budget and social security budget bills for this year. On Thursday the cabinet had passed an emergency order scrapping a planned pension increase and the holiday vouchers for this year, and granting students a 50% public transport subsidy instead of 100% as it was before. The Liberal PM Florin Cîţu said the budget deficit target remains 7.16%, and that special attention will be paid to investments.



    HEATING Mintia thermal power plant, part of the Hunedoara Power Compound in western Romania, was shut down over a coal shortage, which means that around 4,500 flats in Deva as well as public institutions in that town no longer receive heating. This comes amid protests at the coal mines in the Jiu Valley area, where workers are unhappy with delays in salary payments. It is for the 4th time in 6 months that the thermal power plant is not operational for lack of fuel. The energy minister Virgil Popescu said there are short-term solutions for the problems in Hunedoara, but that a long-term plan is also necessary.



    SENTENCE The businessman Ioan Niculae Friday returned from Italy to Romania and turned himself in, after receiving a final 5-year prison sentence from the Bucharest Court of Appeals, for influence peddling and inciting money laundering and tax evasion. According to prosecutors, in 2008 and 2009, his company declared fictitious financial operations to dodge taxes. The state incurred losses of over 2.2 million euro. Niculae already served another prison sentence in a corruption-related case in 2015.



    SKI The Japanese athlete Ryoyu Kobayashi Friday won the Ski Jumping World Cup leg held in Râşnov (central Romania), after the Norwegian Halvor Egner Granerud, the original winner, was disqualified. Kobayashi won his second competition this season and the 18th in his career, with jumps of 94 m and 98.5 m. Next came Kamil Stoch, of Poland, winner of this years Four Hills Tournament, followed by Karl Geiger (Germany). Granerud tops the overall World Cup standings after 22 legs. Another Japanese athlete, Sara Takanashi, won the womens competition in Râşnov, also held on Friday. A mixed team event is scheduled on Saturday. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • Prospects for the Romanian village

    Prospects for the Romanian village

    ‘Rural areas cannot be doomed to poverty and underdevelopment ad infinitum. Almost half of Romania’s population is not connected to the sewerage system and only one in three Romanians living in the rural area is supplied with water from the public water system’ — said Monday the Romanian President Klaus Iohannis at the General Assembly of the Association of Communes from Romania. Moreover, statistics show that two thirds of the rural population is not connected to the natural gas network. According to the Romanian president, future projects should focus on extending the gas network and accessing European funds.



    Klaus Iohannis: “The Romanian village has a huge potential for development. Rural communities don’t lack either ideas or force. What we do lack is a long term plan, a clear-cut strategy and concrete action for the rural potential to be better and more efficiently capitalized on. And this plan should become a priority: let’s put an end to those practices that perpetuate and deepen the inequalities between the rural and urban areas.”



    Children from rural areas should also benefit from the same conditions as those in urban areas. Village depopulation, school dropout, access to early education, the lack of safe learning spaces are some of Romania’s biggest concerns. In order to find adequate solutions to these serious problems, both the central and local authorities needs to come up with an integrated, long-term approach, says the Romanian President.



    According to president Klaus Iohannis it is essential that transparency, integrity, professionalism, fairness and meritocracy should be the principles that should govern the central and local public administration, so as to improve Romanians’ living standards and to bring the services provided by public institutions to the highest level.



    ‘Normal Romania is not that country where some citizens have fewer chances and opportunities simply because they live in the countryside. Each and every Romanian, irrespective of where he or she is living, must have access to quality public services and find in the local administration an honest partner’ President Klaus Iohannis concluded.



    Attending the General Assembly of the Association of Communes from Romania, the environment minister Costel Alexe admitted, in his turn, that the main problem currently facing Romanian villages is the lack of a natural gas network, given that 3.5 million households still use wood for heating, and one in two felled trees turns into ashes.



    Minister Alexe concluded that each and every one of us should think of ways to increase the rate of connection to the natural gas network, so as to reduce the pressure that each of us – mayors, citizens or beneficiaries – is putting on Romania’s forests. (translation by L. Simion)

  • Heating problems in Bucharest ahead of winter season

    Heating problems in Bucharest ahead of winter season

    Recent rumours regarding the impending bankruptcy of the public utility company RADET have been confirmed this week by a final ruling of the Bucharest Court of Appeals. The judges dismissed the appeals and upheld the decision made in April this year by the Bucharest Court, which had rejected the companys reorganisation plans and declared it bankrupt instead.



    Without any significant investments for the past 50-60 years, Bucharests public heating system has shown ever more frequent signs of failure, and the temporary suspension of hot water and heating supply in order to fix breakdowns has turned into a regular practice.



    As Bucharests Mayor General Gabriela Firea explained before the Court hearing, a prospective windup of RADET is not to mean that the heating supply system will be dismantled. Instead, the utility will be taken over by the Termoenergetica Municipal Company.



    One of the causes of RADETs huge debts is the accrual of penalties, which is not related to how the company has been managed, but rather to an unfavourable contract between RADET and ELCEN, on the one hand, and to the actual state of the infrastructure, the Mayor also explained. ELCEN, a state-owned company set up in 2002, is the biggest producer of thermal power in Romania. There is a 10-day delay between ELCENs invoices to RADET and the date when RADET issues invoices to households, because the company has to read some 36,000 heat meters, the authorities explained. This is why, for years in a row, RADET has been unable to collect the money to pay its invoices in due time, and this delay led to penalties imposed by ELCEN.



    The thermal power producer took advantage of its position in the market and did not agree to streamline the economic circuit so as to help RADET from amassing penalties and artificial debts, the Municipality also argues.



    The Economy Minister Virgil Popescu promised however that the people of Bucharest will not be left without heating and hot water, because ELCEN is willing and able to continue to supply thermal power to households. The only aspect left to clarify is the operator that will carry and deliver it. The Bucharest City Hall announced its intention to take over the service through a company it has recently set up, Termoenergetica, but this company is neither licensed as a public utility, nor has it signed a contract in this respect with ELCEN.


    (translated by: Ana-Maria Popescu)