The Minister of Environment and Energy said this Tuesday (14) that Portugal is far from meeting the criteria for declaring an energy crisis and revealed that the European Commission is preparing a temporary regulation to help sectors most exposed to energy prices.
“We are not in those yet [critérios] and I think that at the moment we are far from those criteria. In any case, to prevent what could happen, the European Commission has an informal council on the 23rd and 24th of April with the heads of State and Government and has already sent us a public consultation, a consultation with the Member States, on a new DG Competition regulation, a temporary regulation to help the sectors most exposed to energy prices”, said Maria da Graça Carvalho.
Speaking to journalists, at the end of the XV Environmental Engineering Student Forum taking place today at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, the minister stressed that “even if the crisis criteria are not reached, everything will be prepared”.
On March 20, Maria da Graça Carvalho admitted that Portugal was “close to the criteria” to declare an energy crisis.
“We are getting close to the criteria by which we can declare an energy crisis,” said Maria da Graça Carvalho in statements to journalists in Lisbon, noting that the executive was “analyzing and quantifying” different support measures.
Regarding these statements about three weeks ago, Maria da Graça Carvalho explained today that “at that time there was a very rapid increase in gas prices”.
“That was when the gas attack on Qatar took place. Then the price of gas stabilized, now the price of fuel has even dropped, it has dropped compared to the previous week. Anyway, when negotiations failed, it increased again, a barrel is now over 100 dollars again, but just now news has arrived saying that they are going to resume negotiations. Let’s hope that these negotiations are successful. If we achieve negotiations and that there are no problems with the territories, within a reasonable time, we will be able to escape having a crisis,” he said.
Stressing the hope that negotiations between the United States and Iran will evolve positively, the minister was, however, peremptory, always underlining the importance of the response being European and concerted: “If this goes on for several months, we have to be prepared.”
“It is important that we coordinate at European level so that there is no distortion of the internal market and especially in countries that are interconnected like we are with the rest of Europe. If one country helps much more than the others, it distorts all competition and this is harmful for Europe as a whole”, he said.
The German Government announced on Monday a package of measures to alleviate fuel prices for consumers and companies, worth 1.6 billion euros.
Asked whether the Portuguese executive is considering taking identical individual cases, Maria da Graça Carvalho reiterated: “A set of measures with limits allowed by the European Union is very important to standardize what will happen in aid, as happened in 2022”.
Maria da Graça Carvalho admitted concerns about diesel and aviation fuel, but reiterated that Portugal “is better protected than other Member States and other countries in the world”.
“In electricity production, we are very protected, we have more than 80% renewable energy. Rarely does the price of gas dictate the price of electricity, because most of the hours it is renewable energy that dictates the price of electricity, so we are very protected there. On the other hand, our import [de combustíveis fósseis] it is almost all from the Atlantic: Brazil, Nigeria, the United States and also Algeria”, he said.
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