Mr. President of the Academy,
Ladies and gentlemen,

First, I want to welcome the increasing involvement of the Romanian Academy in the most important topics for the life of the Romanian society. Little time ago, we were in the same place to discuss about regional development. Now, we discuss about energy and it is extremely beneficial because, in this institution, there is credibility, necessary knowledge and objectivity to launch projects which transcend some electoral cycles or some legitimate interests up to a point, which emerge in certain periods of time.
I want to congratulate all initiators of this Pact for energy and to tell on behalf of the Government, that all the eight undertaken objectives are correctly defined, are objectives which the Government deems as extremely necessary and useful and obviously, as you said at the beginning, this Pact cannot represent a strategy in the broad sense, but surely, is the backbone of the energy strategy of Romania. I totally agree that a decision to have a Pact on energy, and subsequently, a strategy for energy, cannot and should not be only in the responsibility of a Government, or even of Parliament. The idea of uniting the academic environment, university environment, private environment, to identify together the best development solutions for future is surely the best possible strategy and the one that can provide on average and long term some of the most important development directions.
I am also here to reaffirm the fact that without being a specialist as those who worked directly at the Pact for Energy, I managed to understand enough quickly that energy represents for Romania one of the possible development engines, but alike as any great opportunity, it equally represents a danger. It depends on us to know how to turn this eventual danger into an opportunity for Romania. It is very clear that world changes, the region where Romania is, changes, that the challenges on the energy market affect immediately, also on average and long term the development possibilities, the daily life, industrial development which inevitably depends on energy, social peace, because not far from Romania, we see serious social turbulences that surely did not have as unique source, the issue of energy, but which, at a certain moment, broke out exactly from the way in which the development or the under-development of the energy market reflect upon daily life of population. I think that together with you and based on these eight priority directions about which I state once again that they are legitimate, are well- defined, and from the Government ‘standpoint, covers in reality the main priorities of Romania, I think we can based on these priority areas, to try over the next period, to formulate those correct answers, to take those necessary decisions, and especially - here is the great weakness of the Romanian society, very many times we managed to have very good strategies, sometimes we had pacts for certain areas, seldom did we manage to implement them with consistency. Maybe such a good pact as the current one will need over the next period of what missed to other actions of this kind, the ability to implement on average and long term and the consistency of such a policy.

I told that without being a specialist, I realized how great the challenges are. I think slowly, slowly, I will necessarily start to become a professional and understand that energy produced from coal, surely, is so dear to those in the area that I represent, has and should have a future, but may it or may not hold in competition with other types of energy production?
I understand very well and certainly it was easier in opposition to ask why groups III and IV of the Cernavoda do not develop further, I understood very well that we need renewable energy, but this energy must be sustainable for the economic life and we must find the right balance of energy mix, like my colleague. Mr. Iancu would say. We could see together how the biggest energy producer on the Romanian market, Hidroelectrica, went through extremely difficult times, was at the edge of bankruptcy and I hope that now, in the new situation, restores and has a perspective for the future. I think, indeed, that the strategy of involving private capital in all public energy companies is the right strategy, as well as ensuring a high – performance management, corporate management.
These are challenges that we have, certainly, every day and I would like to get into these discussions everyday - look, I forgot for this morning talking about unconventional energy sources, and how necessary or unnecessary are to Romania, about the results more than encouraging of offshore exploration and I really wish that all projects developed during this period to ensure those resources are absolutely necessary Romania. I know very clearly that if in the near future, we will not become energy exporters specifically, we discuss in vain about energy development, we will not have exactly to whom to sell it in Romania. Challenges are very high that we need to address them daily as Government but which must subsume to a vision, medium and long term thinking.
And to conclude, however, this thinking must be based on what you said in this pact, namely energy security and independence. A country dependent on imported energy is a weak country. And I think Romania can and has the natural chance to be naturally independent in terms of energy. I think Romania should take all the measures to save all types of energy production again by natural or divine support, as you wish. We have potential, hydro and coal and nuclear and for renewable energy and we must take care that none of these types kills each other, because I think that Romania's energy power will be just the ability to ensure production of all these types.

Certainly, we are still the country that consumes too much energy with a very low efficiency. Sure, maybe I went too high from the start - I was in Denmark and I saw how much energy is consumed to produce certain goods and the difference to Romania is huge. Again, maybe I visited a champion of energy efficiency, but if we do not set ambitious objectives, certainly we will never achieve them.
I truly believe that market rules should govern, there must be private capital, and private investment must be supported. The state will not have the resources to invest over the next period and then they can only come from the private area, which means, obviously, a much greater control and greater involvement of the person who invests the money. Given private money, the state cannot decide every time. The state and public policy have an obligation to try where there are dangers of impaired social peace to interfere with stabilization balancing measures, but as little and as seldom as possible.

I also believe that together with academia, university and business environment in the area, we can in the future to ensure stable and predictable regulatory framework. There will be situations where the legislative framework that we set and it turned out to be too optimistic or maybe because of not taking into account developments in the near future.

There, surely, we should make adjustments but what matters is that more stable is the legislation; much chances we have for the sector development to be indeed sustainable.

A last topic. I want and hope not to be too ambitious; I want that Romania indeed within EU, and within regional framework, to really use this potential and these advantages which it has not used so far. Each time, I enforced decisions I did not participated in their making, simply we took over mimetically systems which were not necessarily conducive to the development of Romania, we simply did not have the courage to consider ourselves a country that can be important in the region on the energy market.

Next week, an European Council dedicated alongside other topics, to the energy issue, reflects in fact a difficult situation at European level, how we proceed to produce in Europe cheaper energy, how to succeed to use energy for the development of Europe, and to bridge the increasing visible development gap between Europe and the rest of the world.

If you allow me to use without copyright the ideas you set out today in the mandate that Romanian Delegation will have to the European Council; I want Romania to be present not only at the discussion table as simple spectator and enforcer of European policies, but as a dynamic actor, involved with important ideas, with an important experience and lot of courage, more than other European countries to go towards new sources of energy, towards making important decisions. It is an objective that I truly believe in, and I repeat the eight priority directorates that you detailed today following discussions, consultations, the expertise of participants are extremely useful to formulate and further to implement a strategy for Romania, meant to ensure all a development based on what represents one or one of the least really strong engines of Romania: the energy.
I want to congratulate you once again and to thank you for the work and expertise put into the service of concluding this pact for energy, and to state once again the total support of the Government for the eight priority directions and to express my hope that together with you, we manage to break the old curse, that to have pacts, very good strategies which afterwards nobody translates into practice. I think we can do this.
I want to thank once again the Romanian Academy for hosting this event and to tell that this is clearly the good direction to involve the Academia, university environment, private industry representatives, if we head towards this direction, we will surely succeed in what we aimed at.

Thank you and I wish you success in the further discussions.