Murat Sungur Bursa, the president of Zorlu Holding’s energy department, said Turkey had to take immediate precautions to make investment more attractive for the private sector. Bursa emphasized that no positive step so far had been taken to improve the investment environment of the country but he stressed that the private sector plays a crucial role in battling supply shortages that may adversely hit Turkey within the next ten years.“The private sector is reluctant to invest,” said Bursa. “It doesn’t mean that we will uproot our plants here and move somewhere else in the very short-term. But now we are proceeding with feasibility studies on how much extra revenue we could get if we moved our natural gas power plants,” he added.
Bursa was speaking at the “Workshop for Electricity Supply Safety of Turkey,” co-sponsored by the World Bank and the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources. Bureaucrats, representatives from private companies and experts from the World Bank participated in the meeting held in Ankara yesterday.
“Investment in the energy sector is free as if it were in a bird cage. It doesn’t resemble other sectors that have full freedom. If you want us to invest in energy, you have to provide us with the proper environment,” said Bursa. They were presently proceeding with a $2 billion investment plan as Zorlu Energy outside Turkey, Bursa said. He added they could do more in Turkey as long as the conditions were reasonable. Bursa also touched on developments regarding nuclear energy plants and hinted their intention to invest in nuclear “without even the slightest hesitation.”
Participants reached a consensus that an energy shortage was looming and preemptive measures had to be taken. Experts there noted that if the present tendencies were preserved and if the economy kept growing at six percent, Turkey’s electricity demand would hit 300 billion kwh by 2015. That means, starting from 2009 Turkey will be face to face with a serious electricity shortage. In figures, by 2012 there will be 40 billion kwh in excess demand yearly.
Energy Deputy Undersecretary Bekir Aksoy related the probability of facing power outages in the summer months of 2008. Aksoy proposed that national regulations be made neater and public-owned power plants be rehabilitated to overcome the energy problem. Aksoy also suggested that prices had to be determined by a free market so the investment environment could get better.
Benzer Haberler 
National
