Péter Szijjártó in Bucharest, Romania
The greatest threat to Hungary’s secure energy supply today is not physical or technical problems, but the fact that this existential issue is treated as a political-ideological question in Europe, Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Péter Szijjártó said Tuesday during a panel discussion at the Romanian International Energy Conference in Bucharest.
The minister emphasized that secure energy supply for Hungary is clearly a rational, physical issue that is primarily determined by infrastructure. He sharply criticized European decision-makers for no longer being able to assess energy-related issues on the basis of common sense.
The politician warned that European policy makers want to ban certain energy sources and that certain forms of energy production – especially nuclear energy – are under constant ideological attack.
Péter Szijjártó highlighted the need for Russian energy sources from the perspective of a landlocked country like Hungary.
Since the country has no access to the sea, it can only obtain oil and natural gas via existing pipelines. “We Hungarians are often attacked for using Russian energy sources as if this were a political choice or a matter of taste. But it is not,” he emphasized. “This decision is based on the physical reality of geography and infrastructure,” the minister explained. He stressed that reliability, compliance with contracts, and a reasonable price are the only relevant criteria for procurement, regardless of the source.
Currently, crude oil is supplied via pipelines from Russia and Croatia. If Russian sources were eliminated, supplying Hungary would be simply impossible due to the insufficient capacity of the remaining infrastructure, confirmed Péter Szijjártó.
The situation is even more acute in the gas sector. Hungary has already had to accept a shortfall of 18 billion cubic meters in incoming capacity after Ukraine stopped transit this year, he recalled. The minister warned that the EU’s efforts to make it impossible to use the TurkStream pipeline would mean the loss of a further 8.6 billion cubic meters. A cumulative loss of 26.5 billion cubic meters of annual incoming capacity would put a landlocked country in an extremely difficult position.
It is therefore clear that the remaining infrastructure will simply not be able to supply Hungary if Russian sources are cut off,”
he explained.
The minister confirmed Hungary’s support for diversification, but criticized Brussels’ response. When Hungary and countries in the region approached the EU to expand the capacity of Southeast European infrastructure, they were given a negative response because gas was “no longer sexy” and would no longer be part of the energy mix in ten years anyway. “This is madness,” said Péter Szijjártó. “On the one hand, pressure is being exerted on us to cut ourselves off from Russian sources, and on the other hand, we are being rejected when we ask for help with diversification,” he added.
The minister highlighted the positive aspects of Hungarian-Romanian energy cooperation, in particular the recent expansion of the capacity of the bidirectional interconnector to 2.7 billion cubic meters per year. In addition, negotiations were underway on a contract that would allow Hungary to purchase natural gas from the soon-to-open Neptun Deep field in the Black Sea, he added.
In conclusion, Péter Szijjártó called for an urgent change in the EU’s ideologically based energy policy in order to regain Europe’s competitiveness, as energy prices on the continent are many times higher than those in the US or China.
“We must return to the original meaning of the basic concepts,” he emphasized. Diversification is about more supply routes, not fewer; affordability is about cheaper energy, not more expensive energy; and non-discrimination means that nuclear energy must be given back all its rights and respect, the minister said.
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Via mti.hu; Featured image: Facebook/Péter Szijjártó
The post Foreign Minister Calls for an End to the EU’s Ideological Energy Policy appeared first on Hungary Today.
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