Romania is burning, and so it shall stay
27 July 2024
This year, 2024, is the hottest year registered so far, or perhaps the coldest we will ever experience from now on. While reporting on stories of the most devastating heatwave Romania has registered in recent years, the local media seem to have overlooked a project that may change the course of the country's carbon neutrality promises.
Neptun Deep, a shared project between OMV Petrom and nationally owned Romgaz, aims to transform Romania into the biggest natural gas exporter in the EU. Exploiting gas from the Black Sea is expected to start in 2027 and may produce 30 times the amount of energy Romanian households require yearly. With an investment of roughly 4 billion dollars only in the developmental phase, the project will lead to a 0.67% increase in the Romanian GDP from 2022 to 2024. While OMV Petrom prides itself on the countless economic benefits, small voices whisper of catastrophe.
 | Alexandra Drugescu-Radulescu Greenpeace warns that Neptun Deep sounds too good to be true, because it represents an environmental disaster under disguise. Firstly, the gas wells will be placed only 200 km away from the shores of Ukraine, a country plagued by a devastating conflict. In a political climate in which naval mines are discovered weekly in the Black Sea, one can not help but wonder if it is a responsible decision to place highly flammable infrastructure at the border of a war-zone. The population on both Romanian and Ukrainian shores may be in danger, and we don’t mean just humans. Neptun Deep will negatively affect biodiversity in the Black Sea, as most plans suggest the chemical water used over the 20-year lifespan of the project will be discharged back into the sea. By 2047, around 276 million tonnes of greenhouse gases will be launched into the atmosphere, roughly the emissions produced by Austria over three and a half years. With high hopes for much-needed economic gain, Romanian authorities seemed to forget all promises of climate neutrality. As the fight against Neptun Deep seems to be more of a whisper than a real challenge against oil conglomerates, one can not help but wonder if Romania will stay ‘burning forever’. |
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