Our View: Time for government to put politics aside and ensure energy supply

Top executives of ExxonMobil and QatarEnergy were at the presidential palace on Tuesday for the signing of a joint declaration with the government that gave the status of ‘marketable’ to two gas fields in Cyprus’ EEZ. Although this does not mean the gas fields would ever be developed, President Nikos Christodoulides put the obligatory positive spin on the signing of this document by resorting to platitudes. The declaration, he said, “is clear evidence and a vote of confidence in the prospects of Cyprus’ EEZ, but also in the prospects of the eastern Mediterranean to develop as a potential energy corridor for Europe.” A day later, energy expert and Sunday Mail columnist Dr Charles Ellinas told Cyprus News Agency that the declaration “did not mean the companies will proceed with development” and that he was concerned that the government was making “huge concessions to the companies,” because it was “mainly interested in the political part of the agreements rather than the commercial part.” Sadly, the Christodoulides government has always been more interested in presentation and communication strategy rather than the nitty-gritty of governing a country. While the president was talking about a “potential energy corridor to Europe,” technocrats and politicians were warning that in 2030, if the Vassiliko LNG terminal is not operational, the country would be faced with major electricity shortages. While the problem was caused by the previous government’s blundering incompetence it has to be dealt with by the current government, which appears to have been reluctant to treat it with the importance and urgency it merits. It was exactly two years ago that the Chinese consortium broke the contract it had for the terminal and the authorities are still nowhere near finding a contractor to complete the project. French consultants, Technip Energies were hired to conduct the so-called gap analysis, find out how much progress had been made, assess the quality of the work and help the authorities draft specifications for potential contractors to submit an expression of interest. There will be negotiations with the potential contractors to establish how long will be needed for the project to be completed, before a tenders’ procedure is set in motion. If all this is not completed by the end of this year, and work does not begin in 2027 the prospect of the terminal being ready by 2030 is poor, Energy Minister Michalis Damianos told Politis newspaper. The government has been aware of this tight timeframe for some time. By the end of 2029 the EAC must decommission power turbines at Dhekelia power station and three at the Vasiliko plant, which would mean production would be reduced by some 700 megawatts. The EAC would put in place five smaller units by 2029, but these will not cover the shortfall. Storage facilities will be set up before next summer, making use of power from RES, but the technocrats claim, again, this would not cover the shortfall. If the government had been aware of this danger looming in the near future, it would not have been dragging its feet over the Great Sea Interconnector, which had the full support of the European Commission, and refusing to honour its agreement with Admie. Instead of going ahead with the project, it has put it on hold so that another viability study is carried out because there were some protests about the small levy that would have been put on electricity bills this year to cover the initial costs. As the levy would have been unpopular, the government irresponsibly decided to delay the start of the project on the pretext that another viability study was needed. Was it so unaware of our precarious energy situation that it put the GSI on hold? And two years after the Vasiliko gas terminal contract was broken, the search for a company that would complete the project has not even begun. But the government seems more interested in marketing gas fields that might never be developed, than working, with a sense of urgency, to find practical solutions for the real problems facing the country.