Romania seeking to postpone shutdown of lignite power plants
BUCHAREST, Oct 16 (Reuters) — Romania will seek European Commission approval to postpone the closure of its lignite-fired power plants, Energy Minister Sebastian Burduja said on Monday.
The government has committed to phasing out lignite — or brown coal — from 2026 under its European Union-funded recovery aid package, although Burduja said he would temper expectations for now on a change to the date.
State-owned lignite power holding CE Oltenia has partnered with three private companies — OMV Petrom, Tinmar and Alro Slatina — to build solar parks and gas-fired power plants as part of Romania’s energy shift.
“Unfortunately, because of delays, the lignite shutdown will not coincide with the coming online of these new projects, which might create difficulties for the national power grid,” Burduja told a news conference.
The minister said he would go to Brussels for talks on the postponement this month.
(Reporting by Luiza Ilie, writing by Jason Hovet; editing by Toby Chopra and Jason Neely)
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