Brussels, 25/05/2016 (Agence Europe) - The gradual process of liberalising the Bulgarian energy market, gas infrastructure projects and addressing energy poverty were central to the visit to Bulgaria of Energy and Climate Commissioner Miguel Arias Canete on Wednesday 25 and Thursday 26 May.
In Sofia, Canete was due to have meetings with President Rossen Plevneliev, Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov and Energy Minister Temenuzhka Petkova.
“The Commission welcomes the efforts of the Bulgarian authorities on working towards opening up its electricity market to competition. A competitive market is essential not only for modernising the Bulgarian electricity system, but also to lead towards a fully-integrated EU energy market. Overall, this is crucial to offering consumers high quality services and fair prices”, said Canete before leaving.
In addition to the electricity market, discussions will cover the Bulgarian gas sector and the Bulgarian gas hub project. Only 7% of the country's gross inland gas consumption is covered by domestic production. Due to a lack of interconnections with neighbouring countries, Bulgaria is dependent on a single gas supplier, making it particularly vulnerable, the Commission says.
As part of its efforts to diversify member states' energy supplies, the Commission is pushing for completion of key infrastructure projects that will help diversification, such as the Interconnector Greece-Bulgaria (IGB), through works of the Central Eastern and South-Eastern European Gas Connectivity (CESEC) group, set up by the Commission in February 2015 (see EUROPE 11249).
If the Russian South Stream gas pipeline project is killed off, Bulgaria is considering resuscitating it in a different form to feed into its gas hub project Balkan (see EUROPE 11468). (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)