During the debate, Vladimír said, among other things, “I agree with the ERO’s draft price decision, although I think the renewal of the RES contribution should have been better communicated. The rules on which we have been building resources, transmission system and business models for 60 years should not be changed due to the emergency situation. The emergency measures need to be rolled back. Yes, it will hurt. But the sooner we reinstate the Renewables Charge, the better. Let’s not make politics out of it.”
Another topic was the controversial interpretation of the possibilities of using the Modernisation Fund. Vladimír Hlavinka replied, “I would use the funds from emission allowances and the Modernisation Fund for investments in the future development of the transmission and distribution system, including the connection of renewable sources, not for operational support of renewable sources and covering the consequences of the poor setting of feed-in tariffs in the past, even though we will be sticking to them for another 7 years.”
What else was said in the debate? That we are certainly not doomed to be in the top third of countries with the highest energy prices. Above all, it depends on how our energy sector as a whole will evolve, how its resources, transmission system and business models related to the development of renewable energy will look like. If we start thinking smarter and working with data, the price for the final consumer should be more in the bottom quartile of countries ranked by energy price.
“It is necessary to make up for the wasted decade when the state fell asleep in the innovation of the Czech energy sector. We have long been in opposition to what is happening in Europe – how smart grids are being built, smart metering is being introduced, data is being worked with, the distribution transmission system is being built to be ready for renewable options with zero variable costs. New business models need to be devised to respond to the fact that unregulated resources are only able to deliver at certain times. Our production base is one of the best in Europe. It allows us to start the development of renewable energy sources, so let’s take advantage of it,” said Vladimír Hlavinka in response to one of the moderator’s questions.
As Vladimír further pointed out, energy prices were at such a level before the energy crisis that most companies were not sufficiently interested in the management of purchasing and energy management, corporate energy managers were on the verge of extinction. Few companies were concerned about their corporate energy, energy was procured purely through the purchasing department. “That is why I am involved in the Modern Energy Association, why I and my colleagues from ORGREZ Group advise companies and municipalities on how to use their resources more intelligently and why we develop innovative solutions that can properly complement the conventional energy with large resources in the interests of companies, consumers and the environment,” Hlavinka concluded his speech on ČT 24.