Romania parliament postpones gas price deregulation to 2021
The Romanian parliament's lower house on Wednesday postponed planned deregulation of household gas prices by two and a half years to July 2021 aiming to support consumers in the European Union's second-poorest state.
Romania is deregulating its power and gas markets in stages for households and industrial consumers under a plan agreed two years ago linked to an aid deal led by the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission.
The Commission, which requires all member states to align their energy prices over a number of years, will need to sign off on the timetable change.
Energy Minister Razvan Nicolescu said on Tuesday that Romania had one of the most ambitious deregulation timetables of any EU states and that a postponement was necessary as average wages had fallen by 1 percent over the last two years while gas tariffs had risen 16 percent.
Energy utilities have hailed the postponement, saying consumption is falling and both households and industry cannot afford price hikes.
More than 8 million people and some industrial users pay energy prices capped by national regulator ANRE, which directs domestically produced gas, which is significantly cheaper than imported gas, towards households.
Romania has committed to fully liberalising its power and gas prices by 2017 and 2018, respectively.
It imports less than a fifth of its gas from Russia and produces the rest from local fields.
Reporting by Luiza Ilie
