WARSAW – Poland, the host of the 2013 United Nations climate change conference, has been concerned with the transition to a low CO2 emissions industry. Warsaw will assume a great diplomatic responsibility for the climate change agenda this year as the Polish capital hosts the next round of the UN negotiations.
However, Assembly of European Regions President Michele Sabban noted that big climate events rarely produce results. Instead, effective decisions are taken locally at the municipality of regions, she told New Europe on the sidelines of an AER conference on the Crisis and the Regions on 8 March hosted by the College of Europe in Natolin, Warsaw, a breath-taking institution surrounded by a natural park with old oak trees. Sabban, who is also the president of Regions of Climate Action (R20) plans to visit Warsaw again later this year for the UN climate talks to present the regions’ positions on climate change.
Poland, which heavily relies on coal production, has been struggling to sell its unused emission quotas. The country is also suffering from high gas prices and wants to reduce its reliance on Russia. Poland is looking at the possibility of accelerating shale gas production and improving efficiency.
Marlene Holzner, the spokesperson for EU Energy Commissioner Günther Oettinger told New Europe by phone from Brussels that it’s up to every member state to decide whether they want to use shale gas. “We have no specific legislation in place which says you can just do it under these and these conditions. Poland is free to do it just as Ukraine, which is not a member, but has said it wants to do it and a number of member states,” she said.
“Shale gas could European-wise replace the level of gas that we already have in Europe,” Holzner said, adding that conventional European gas production will decrease in the future. But she noted that shale gas will never replace all of Europe’s gas needs.
Adam Struzik, Marshal of Mazowleckie Voivodeship, the biggest region of Poland that includes Warsaw, told New Europe on the sidelines of the AER conference that Poland’s power sector is based on coal and is importing 11 billion cubic metres of gas, mainly from Russia, and is producing 4 billion cubic metres of its own. “We, in Mazowleckie, have potential areas where shale gas might be present and we hope all this will greatly help us in our energy balance and in our balance of trade for resources, including power. We pay a lot of money for oil and gas,” Struzik said.
Asked about the next round of UN talks in Warsaw, he said realism ought to prevail. “On one hand, we should do everything to curb emissions, but we should do it rationally without killing off entire areas of the economy,” Struzik said. “You need to support a low-emission economy by looking at other sources of energy, by limiting energy consumption - and there is a lot of room for investment in different areas - but you can’t stick to a doctrine and say you will reach a threshold in 2050, for instance. Some of these figures are a product of wishful thinking and not economic reality and you can have a situation where all European companies will move to Asia.”
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