What if Ukraine exported energy?
Last week on Wednesday, Ukraine has celebrated
its Independence Day. It was a special 24th of August as it marked the 25th
anniversary of the Declaration of Independence of Ukraine back in 1991. I'm
very much looking forward to visiting Kyiv this Friday and to meet with our
Ukrainian partners.
This visit comes at a difficult time for
Ukraine: unfortunately there is an armed conflict ongoing in the East of the
country.
And the illegal annexation of Crimea and
Sevastopol shows that the ideals for which so many Ukrainians demonstrated on Maidan Nezalezhnosti and in other
squares all across the country in the recent past are still far from fully
coming true.
Despite, and even because of those difficult
conditions, it is important that we work together on modernising
Ukraine. I already had the opportunity to meet with new Ukrainian Prime
Minister Volodymyr Groysman on 19th July in Brussels.
We both agreed on the need to further reform the Ukrainian energy sector. Those
reforms are central for modernising Ukraine's
economy, to bring advantages to consumers and enterprises alike, and thereby to
unlock the potential for higher standards of living.
In this sense, I welcome the decision of the
government of Ukraine on the unbundling of Naftogaz.
It is now important to implement this decision swiftly and consistently in the
months ahead. In parallel, Ukraine's potential in the field of energy
efficiency and renewable energy is huge:
If Ukraine increases its energy efficiency to
the EU average level, it could save more energy than what all of Spain
consumes.
Ukraine could thus even become an exporter of
energy! The European Commission is prepared to support the establishment of the
corresponding Energy Efficiency Fund before the end of this year.
We also want to re-launch the successful
trilateral format of gas talks involving Ukraine, Russia and the European
Commission. In the past, this forum has proven its usefulness: it is better for
all to sit down together around one table. Russia as an exporter, Ukraine as a
transit country and the EU as the main importer share a common interest of
predictability.
Looking back at the 1990s when I was serving
the government of Slovakia, we were also faced with high pressure to reform.
Similarly to Ukraine today, we were doing it under difficult circumstances. But
there is no alternative to reforms. Transforming Ukraine's energy sector is
central towards further changes in other sectors.
European Commission
http://ec.europa.eu/commission/2014-2019/sefcovic/announcements/what-if-ukraine-exported-energy_en