Premier: Slovakia Can Benefit from Big Gas Storage Facilities in Ukraine
Brussels, October 22 (TASR-correspondent) – Energy conclusions agreed by EU prime ministers and presidents at the EU summit in Brussels ensure that European households and businesses should benefit from measures to mitigate the sharp rise in energy prices in the short term; in the long run, Slovakia wants to help the EU with its transit possibilities, for example, in greater use of gas storage facilities in Ukraine, Prime Minister Eduard Heger (OLaNO) said on Friday after the end of a two-day EU summit.
During the talks, the Slovak premier pointed out that the European Commission had issued a manual on how each member state could proceed in terms of the single market and face this crisis. However, he emphasised that the EU should learn from the current energy situation and define minimum quantities of gas in storage.
Arriving at the summit, Heger noted that Ukraine has large gas storage facilities – up to 30 billion cubic metres, which is higher capacity than it is currently using. According to him, Slovakia is ready to use its transit possibilities and be an important player in the EU in solving the energy crisis.
“In the event that we, as the EU, agree to use these storage tanks, transit through Slovakia is possible. This should be agreed, but if the final solution was such that the storage tanks would be filled through Slovakia in the summer, and then in the winter, gas would get to Europe also via Slovakia, that would be a very interesting model,” admitted the prime minister.
According to the conclusions of the summit, the European Council will propose to the European Commission to assess the current crisis situation in the energy market and come up with solutions.
Heger added that in addition to proposals to have gas tanks filled in the EU before each winter, leaders’ discussions also focused on trying to have stable energy sources, which, according to him, also include nuclear energy.
“Slovakia also clearly confirmed this. We see that in terms of the stability of the electrical grid, nuclear power plants are the strongest and most secure source,” he stated.