Coal+… and what next?

The program convention of Law and Justice from July 5-7, from the point of view of the energy sector, passed under the slogan “coal plus” articulated by Minister Piotr Naimski. The energy panel was an opportunity to support nuclear energy, not renewable energy.

– Poland is a part of the Europe, part of the world, and rules from outside are imposed on us. They cause that by preserving coal, we have to keep certain standards. The energy strategy should be based on the slogan: “Coal plus”. We have coal in Poland and this coal is and will remain one of the pillars of our energy security. (…) This “plus” for coal will mean mainly additional raw materials. We must have gas, oil, we need to have RES, we must have access and implemented instruments using nuclear energy – said the minister quoted by the Polish Press Agency.

He announced that Poland should have at least six nuclear reactors by 2040. – We have an ambitious program for building nuclear energy. By 2040, we want to build at least 6 nuclear reactors that will provide 20 percent of the energy consumed in Poland – he said.

The Minister’s statement was devoid of specific signals in favor of Renewable Energy Sources. The convention was held in Katowice. An interesting accent was giving the president of Law and Justice Jarosław Kaczyński a gift from mine rescuers.

Interestingly, the Minister of Entrepreneurship and Technology Jadwiga Emilewicz, known for promoting RES, did not take part in the energy convention panel, but in the panel “City Plus”. During it she spoke about the plan for decentralization of central institutions supported, among others, by the Jagiellonian Club from Cracov, from which the minister comes.

The politological analysis of the statements from the latest Law and Justice convention allows to confirm the theses suggested earlier in BiznesAlert.pl. One should not expect acceleration of regulation in favor of the RES sector until the parliamentary elections in autumn 2019: there will be no liberalization of the distance law, nor larger concessions for this sector. It is not known whether a special offshore bill would be created. However, a decisive statement on nuclear energy would suggest speeding up the work to update the Polish Nuclear Power Program and concretizing the plan to include the USA in the financing model for the Polish nuclear power plant.

Minister Naimski announced such acceleration. It is worth recalling that during the holidays we will know the final shape of the energy strategy, that is no longer a project, but the proper Energy Policy of Poland until 2040. Will PPEJ be updated after this?

Perhaps the credibility of the ruling party towards the electorate, especially from Silesia, where the convention took place, required the word coal plus slogan. However, we need more to finally decide what sources, besides coal, will provide Poland with safety and lower energy prices, i.e. nuclear acceleration is needed. Its absence would put into question the credibility of the Polish energy strategy.