The Energy Communities Law could be adopted on Thursday, announced Minister of Investments and European Projects, Dragoș Pîslaru, who added that the aim is to encourage municipalities to apply for projects together with private consumer networks.
“I’m not 100% sure, but there is a 90% chance that in two days, that is, on Thursday, we will adopt the Energy Communities Law. We are moving in the right direction. I think it has been expected for several years. And today we had a discussion about energy communities. At the moment, we see this measure divided into two, once for private households and then for local authorities. We have this opportunity due to the reprogramming of cohesion funds in the middle of the year, we have the possibility of redirecting funds to households. It has not been decided yet, but we are discussing, it is not my decision, it is the decision of a monitoring committee. We have the opportunity to create a priority for households, we receive additional pre-financing and an extension of the implementation deadline. We have more space to complete investments, especially the difficult ones. We do not want to touch the energy efficiency money. We intend to use part of the 500 million euros to use them for energy efficiency and in renovation to have a mix between energy communities and energy efficiency. From the consultations with the banks, it seems feasible, so we are not redirecting money from energy communities to others, but creating a combined solution between energy efficiency and projects regarding energy communities”, mentioned Dragoș Pîslaru, at the debate on the topic “Funding opportunities through European funds”, organized by AHK Romania.
He was asked about the legal framework regarding energy communities.
At the same time, the minister emphasized that the aim is to encourage municipalities “to apply together with networks of private consumers”, according to Agerpres. “We will give them additional points if the city halls, together with these networks, will apply for the projects, because they have the administrative capacity”, added the minister.