Romania’s ELCEN Might Cut Bucharest Heat Supply In ’08-’09 Winter On Gas Debts

"ELCEN has debts of several tens of millions of US dollars towards gas supplier WIEE, that had already warned us about cutting the gas supply unless ELCEN pays its debts. WIEE ensures the obligatory quota of imported gas from the cost of natural gas needed to produce thermal power in Bucharest," ELCEN’s commercial manager Irina Duica told MEDIAFAX Friday.

 

Duica said that ELCEN cannot pay its debts to the gas supplier because two units of the heating company RADET, RADET Bucuresti and RADET Constanta respectively, owe ELCEN around $86 million.

 

According to the power producer, RADET Bucuresti had debts of 737.5 million lei (EUR1=RON3.7938) end-September and RON767.6 million on October 12, plus delay penalties of around RON600 million. 

 

However, Virgil Ramba, the general manager of RADET Bucuresti, said he had observed the payment plan set up with the gas supplier and had already paid RON70 million out of the RON141 million established as monthly installment between November and next April.

 

"For November, we had already paid RON70 million and we will pay the rest of the monthly installment until December 1 because we have the money," Virgil Ramba said.

 

For 2008, ELCEN, a unit of state-owned electric power producer Termoelectrica, eyes a RON450 million loss. The company switched to a RON119.8 million loss in the first year-half, from a net profit of RON223.6 million in the similar period a year earlier.

 

In 2007, ELCEN, which is the largest thermal power producer in Romania, produced 6.759 billion kWh of electricity, representing 13% of the national production, and 6.662 million giga-calories, covering almost 40% of country’s thermal energy total production.

 

ELCEN owns seven power plants, five units in Bucharest, one in the southeastern city of Constanta and one in the central county of Mures, with a 2,008-MW total installed capacity.