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The draft law for the approval of Government Emergency Ordinance (OUG) 118/2021 with the purpose of mitigating the effects of the energy crisis raises concern for both energy producers, as well as for network operators and energy suppliers, preventing the energy industry to operate on a predictable market, namely in free market conditions, says a press release sent by AHK Romania to AGERPRES on Monday.
According to the quoted source, from AHK's point of view, some principles established in OUG 118/2021 are problematic. The representatives of AHK Romania mention that at the level of the European Union, energy vulnerability is recognized as a social problem and not explicitly as a problem tied to the private energy sector or the energy industry and as such it should be primarily managed by the authorities.
"In addition, OUG 118/2021 requires impressive financial resources which private companies are unjustly obliged to support from their own budget, without having a clear perspective of cost recovery. Regarding the energy networks, this category of economic operators was excluded from the support scheme, despite the fact that it was equally affected by the energy crisis, being forced to acquire energy for covering the network losses from the network at an unprecedented price level on the wholesale market. Regarding the energy production sector, we consider that the draft law leads to a clear discrimination between fossil fuel energy producers and electricity producers, by applying a Windfall type tax for the latter only," the press release mentions.
AHK Romania representatives say that despite the fact that an exceptional tax should only consider retaining exceptional profits, the provisions of OUG no. 118/2021 are reported to the total income, thus generating significant concern regarding covering production costs.
Furthermore, the legislation that aims to address the energy vulnerability should also be clearly formulated as to not allow time intervals between the moment of promoting and the moment of adopting the secondary legislation that details the implementation procedures.
According to the AHK Romania representatives, the energy crisis that we are witnessing "requires targeted solutions in place of the general measures which can lead to a discriminatory treatment among the population, but also between operators on the energy chain." Thus, apart from the direct financial support for the population and SMEs, measures of reducing energy vulnerability are necessary, as well as ensuring the industry's economic competitiveness, through efficient energy policies.
AHK Romania is the official representation of the German economy and also the largest bilateral Chamber of Commerce in Romania.
