The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine with the participation of representatives of the energy sector of the Republic of Lithuania is holding a public discussion on the topic: “Natural gas: transitional fuel between fossil resources and renewable energy sources”
From the point of view of an environmentally conscious person and a supporter of the development of renewable energy, a number of questions arise:
1. Natural gas is also a fossil resource, which is an exhaustive mineral. Combustion of natural gas also heats the atmosphere and leads to increased carbon emissions. In view of this, the achievement of global climate goals is again postponed.
2. Ukrainian gas generating capacity is very outdated. The construction of new facilities will lead to the concentration of financial resources and conservation of the share of gas in the power system, because the life cycle of such an enterprise is 35-40 years. Instead, it is much more efficient to implement energy efficiency measures with such funds.
3. Given the actual electricity surplus in Ukraine, stimulating the construction of additional capacity other than RES seems economically impractical for the state. Instead, the issue of balancing RES should be solved by creating favorable conditions for the construction of electricity storage by businesses
4. The cost of loans for such projects, which increases significantly given the type of technology, leads to an increase in payback periods, and major European banks in general from next year refuse to lend to energy generation projects on fossil fuels.
