site.btaEnvironment Minister Allays Fears Over Offshore Wind Parks

Environment Minister Yulian Popov assured fishermen and the tourist business that nothing will happen at their expense after a bill on offshore wind parks was adopted on first reading. Popov spoke on Bulgarian National Television on Friday night.  

The Minister said that the planned construction of wind power plants is "a good idea in principle", adding that he does not see a serious prospect for offshore wind energy before the end of this decade. According to Popov, there is probably a prospect sometime towards the middle of the next decade because the technology needs to be developed further and go through complex public consultations.   

"I am sure of this because even now the procedures for environmental assessments, the whole process of approving such huge engineering facilities is extremely difficult and long," Popov said and said that no one would allow one industry to be destroyed at the expense of another.  

A few days ago, fishermen from the North Black Sea coast expressed disagreement with the bill. The fishermen said they would wait for the debate on the draft and their next actions would depend on whether the sector's comments would be taken into account. If this does not happen, they did not rule out strike action.  

 On Friday, MPs from Vazrazhdane met with representatives of the fishing industry. At a briefing, MP Kosta Stoyanov described the bill as "lobbyist" and demanded its withdrawal.