Petar Vitanov: In Bulgaria, green and just transition issues have been swept below the floor for a long time. Now, they explode
A miner's statue in Pernik, the former black heart of Bulgaria / photo by Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat
– We all knew in 2020 what was going to happen. Industrial and energetical transitions have been imminent. But the politicians kept putting this topic under the table. Instead of negotiating the conditions for just transition, taking advantage of the opportunities, we were lagging behind – says Petar Vitanov, a former member of the European Parliament (Socialists & Democrats group), in the interview about problems, which Bulgaria faces regarding just transition and modernization of its energy sector.
Interview by Vladimir Mitev and Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat.
Petar Vitanov (born in 1982 in Sofia) was a member of the European Parliament in the 2019-2024 term. He headed the Delegation of Bulgarian Socialists in the EP. As an MEP, he actively worked on the topic of green transition. He was a member of the Committee on Transport and Tourism (TRAN), the Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVY), substitute member of the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE). In 2022, he became coordinator on the Committee on Transport and Tourism for the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D).
He graduated from the First English High School in Sofia, and then studied International Relations at St. Kliment Ohridski University in Sofia and International Finance at New Bulgarian University. From 2013 to 2017 he worked at the National Assembly of the Republic of Bulgaria as a state expert in the International Relations and Protocol Directorate. In 2017, he was elected as a Bulgarian Socialist Party Member of Parliament in the 44th National Assembly and participated in the Foreign Policy and Defence Committees, as well as in the NATO Parliamentary Assembly Delegation and the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly Delegation.
Bulgaria did not defend its own interests with regard to the energetic and industrial transition – you have claimed in a number of interviews. Specifically, what has not been done – and what should have been done?
First, I need to say that I do not share the common opinion that the Green Deal is something bad. I do not share the view that we have to renegotiate the Bulgarians obligations under the deal. It would definitely be impossible. Now we often hear in Bulgarian that the ETS system is not just. But we became members of the European Union in 2007, and the system had been introduced two years earlier! Everyone who had questions or issues concerning this, should have spoken out at that time.
The industrial and energetical transition has been something imminent – and necessary. But the Bulgarian governments, starting from 2008-2009, have decided that the topic should not be touched. The issue was put under the table until it was not possible to renegotiate anything anymore. I also believe that the leadership of the trade unions was also absolutely aware of what had to happen, and what was going to happen.
I would say that Bulgaria’s last chance to renegotiate anything concerning energy transition was the year 2019. Then, we had the last possible option for derogation of the national aid for the coal power plants. The timeline was missed, the opportunity to renegotiate was missed, and therefore in 2020 it became absolutely obvious that these installations could only work on a market-based approach. And we knew that it was not going to be possible in practice at some time, because it would become unreasonable economically.
Let me say this again: we all knew in 2020 what was going to happen. But the politicians kept putting this topic under the table. Instead of negotiating the just transition, taking advantage of the opportunities, we were lagging behind.
I participated in the just transition-related legislation making. Along with the other Bulgarian colleagues from the European Parliament, above the party divisions, we all tried to squeeze as much money for Bulgaria as possible. But in the end, nothing happened. Other countries started receiving money for just transition, while we had not even identified our affected regions! At the beginning, there were only three of them: Stara Zagora, Kyustendil and Pernik, which is a traditional coal region, even though there are no working mines anymore. Then they changed the number of regions to eight. And all the time we were lagging behind.
The former mining direction in Pernik / photo by Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat
Coal phaseout and the following economic transition could be a tool for new development paths, if done in cooperation with the citizens and with their welfare in mind …
In Bulgaria, it was not very popular to speak about this. It was more popular to say that we would not need to close our coal power plants, even now, when there is really nothing we could do about it. The rules of the coal phaseout in Europe are crystal clear.
On a minimum engagement level, Bulgaria could have at least taken what was granted, and try to reshape the economy. Let’s be honest: there are no young miners in Bulgaria. Moreover, in this job, pension rights are reached early because of the type of labor. In 10-15 years, there would be no more miners. There will be no need to fire anyone.
But even given this, regions like Stara Zagora, now one of the richest regions in Bulgaria, would suffer quite a lot – if there are no sustainable plans for the economic development of the region.
In addition, Bulgaria as a country is at the point of a democratic catastrophe. We cannot afford to lose more economically active people. We are in the periphery of Europe. If, due to lack of job opportunities, another 50,000, 100,000 or 150,000 people leave the country, that might be a nightmare for the economy and the recovery. We cannot afford to let these people go.
But the debate, the narrative here was completely different. And now, everybody is unhappy and everybody blames the European Union.
Given that you participated in the legislation about it, how do you appreciate the level of understanding and communication on the topic of just transition in the media – among the experts, generally among stakeholders, in the society, including state central and regional administration?
The topic became really important when Boiko Borisov was the prime minister of Bulgaria. I have no doubts there are good experts, who knew exactly what was going on. But the government kept this topic away from the public. Meanwhile, Borisov’s people were saying “yes, yes, yes” to every demand of the European Council.
This means that the potential development chances of Bulgaria, or at least the chances of reducing the social impact of the industrial transformation were simply blown up for political reasons.
Absolutely! I am sure of that. As I said, in European Council meetings, we never expressed any objections. Until 2022, the representatives of Bulgaria kept saying “yes” to everything, and then did nothing domestically.
I am convinced that the government of Boyko Borissov was sweeping this topic as far away as possible, hoping that this bomb would ultimately go off under the rule of someone else. And now, it is basically happening.
Now everybody blames the political crisis in Bulgaria. But despite so many declarations in the National Parliament, including common declarations that we had to renegotiate the conditions for the coal phaseout. And nothing is going to happen. It is not how European institutions work.
So what can be done at the moment with these conditions that Bulgaria has and with these plans that were written? The coal mines will be closed anyway. The power stations powered by coal will be closed anyway. What can be developed in the regions involved instead?
This is the biggest problem. Now we speak about the recovery plans. We were supposed to receive 6 billion euros for reforms, but also for reshaping our post-COVID economy and greener economy. But nothing was prepared for these coal regions, even though it was absolutely obvious that the power plants would stop working at one moment. You do not even need to put a deadline. It is just not reasonable economically. Denouncing one of the governments because they decided to cut 40% of the capacity of those plants before 2026 is nonsense.
The city of Pernik, formerly a mining centre, now waits for new development opportunities / photo by Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat
In the proper moment, we should have thought about gas corridors. Now, after 2022, gas is however no longer a sustainable source of energy. There is still the question of improving energy efficiency, as we are the least energetically efficient country in the European Union. On investing in nuclear power plants, which I also consider a necessity, we have a consensus now in the national parliament.
Finally, Bulgaria must plan strategically what new productions could appear on the same site where the power plant worked. We speak about well-economically developed region with suitable infrastructure. But unfortunately, we see no big industrial plans. Neither for the region, nor for the money. And now we will end up losing all the money for the recovery fund. I think we received 25% of the money – a year and a half ago. Then, nothing.
We will have to close the power plants and we will not receive the money. This is what is going to happen in the end.
If there is no industrial policy for the regions affected, there are also no attempts to offer a new employment alternative to the workers. Even if they are not so numerous, we are still speaking about thousands of people employed in the mines and in the auxiliary branches of industry. There are no plans for what new branches of industry they could have been engaged in.
Of course. At the same time, one of the problems of the labour market in Bulgaria is the lack of candidates to work.
Often in Bulgaria we have spoken badly about the Soviet Union and planned economy. But now we have to plan and most countries do plan! Most of European countries with coal regions in transition have already received the money and they are far ahead of us, trying to establish new, more economically efficient productions, new technologies. We did nothing and we blame the European Union for that.
Surely, the coal phaseout and the related industrial transition is not happening in the most just way that we could potentially imagine. But the main problem for our workers and our industrial regions is the behaviour of Bulgarian politicians, not the European Union.
How do you appreciate the role of civil society? Or social organizations like trade unions? They didn’t act in the right way?
Maybe I am not supposed to say that, but… We have two main trade union confederations with thousands of members. They have the capacity to follow European legislation and they were absolutely aware of the situation. But they have never done anything. They worked very well with the government back then and they did not bother to blow the whistle. Now, of course, they are against the Green Deal. But when there was time for solutions, they were supporting Boyko Borissov’s government.
I remember that during the mass protests against Borissov in 2020, tens of millions of euros were allocated to the mines and the labour unions negotiated that.
True. When there is money, it is easy to stay silent and things can be swept under the carpet.
But at some point, they cannot be hidden anymore. Therefore, I’m blaming the labour unions just like I blame the politicians. They, too, should have insisted on renegotiating the derogation before 2020. At that time, some of the European states managed to negotiate certain exemptions. We did not.
Now, as I said, nobody is forcing us to close the power plants. But they cannot produce energy at reasonable prices, so they must be closed. The state can no longer afford the losses. What we must do is to improve the sector of green energy in order to meet our needs and demands. Energy efficiency, green energy, nuclear energy – these things are really important.
When this lack of action or failure is seen from Brussels, how is it seen from European institutions?
I can only speak on behalf of my colleagues in the European Parliament. We were aware of the situation. We tried to raise the flag. Nobody paid any attention. The topic is just too unpopular and those who take actions would not be liked. Unfortunately, the civil society does not understand the issue either. The majority of civil organizations and groups blame the European Union, and not our politicians, as well. Finally, if you ask about the green view in general, the connotation is definitely negative, which, in my view, is also quite ridiculous, having in mind that air quality in Bulgaria is really bad. People live here two years less than an average European, because of the bad air quality.
Learning from Polish or Czech experience might be something important. I am aware that Poland is planning to close the coal mines, or at least some of them, in 15 years.
When it comes to a neighbor’s experience, there has been a boom of prosumers – people and households who produce solar electricity on their own – for the last 3 years in Romania. There are around 150 000 prosumers at this moment in Romania. There are communication campaigns on how a citizen can become a prosumer. With regard to just transition, there exist already a number of projects for small businesses. Bulgaria lacks almost any prosumers. How do you evaluate the communication process concerning these electricity production options in Bulgaria?
I think that this green energy cannot solve the big economic issues. It would not be a large-scale production. But it can be extremely useful when it comes to households. We see this all across Europe. But in Bulgaria, unfortunately, not only is the legislation not suitable, but I think that it opens up doors for manipulation.
When I was a member of the National Panel, we introduced a law according to which it was possible to supply your own household with solar systems and the state was forced to buy it. But a lot of small business owners manipulated this law and they just built those solar systems in order to sell it, not to supply their own demands. For example, a lot of people bought very cheap abandoned houses, installed such systems and sold the energy without even living there. What was to be an innovative solution became just a good business niche. Such examples give you the idea that the situation in Bulgaria is incomparable with the other better developed countries, unfortunately.
But why do such things happen in Romania? Is the legislation so much better, or does the difference lie within the society?
If you compare the situation in Bulgaria and Romania, the difference is quite astonishing. Both countries became EU member states at the same time. At that time, they both made about 48% of the European GDP per capita. Now, Romania makes over 70% and Bulgaria is a little over 50%. Romania obviously took advantage of the European institutions better than Bulgaria. Given that their market is bigger, it is probably easier for them, but nevertheless, they did not make as many mistakes as we did. Let us not forget that until around 2010 Romania’s economical situation was worse than Bulgaria’s.
Do you expect that the development of renewable energy would be also exploited by Bulgarian oligarchs, so that they can become rich again by entering a new sector.
Indeed, if you look at who is dealing with renewable energy in Bulgaria, you will see that we are talking about economic oligarchs. I would say that there are two economic cliques, some of them close to Borissov and Peevski and the other one close to the other political power. But in the end, they take advantage of this money. The biggest beneficiaries of the money for the energy renewal are the companies owned by these people, not family business, not small and medium companies. This is extremely disappointing.
If we compare the structure of expenses, the budget that Bulgaria was supposed to get from the Just Transition Fund…
2.3 billion, I believe.
… we can see there is a disproportionate percentage of what was supposed to go for the biggest enterprises. Small and medium enterprises look neglected in the plan and purely social actions, aimed at reskilling workers or raising the living standards in coal regions, seem completely uninteresting to the plan’s authors. It is really a striking difference in comparison to Polish, Czech, and even Romanian just transition concepts.
That’s one of the reasons that I really want to take a break from Bulgarian politics. We are seeing economic interests behind every political party here. And the level of lobbying in the legislation is astonishing.
Our final question would go a bit beyond our main topic, but – from where could a change come to Bulgaria? What can be done if the politics is not to look like this forever and ever? How could the citizens be empowered?
Let’s be honest, the turnout will be less than 30% in the upcoming elections (it was 38% at the 27 October 2024 parliamentary elections – note of the editor), which is a proof of the disappointment of the society in general. We have a huge political crisis and people are unwilling to participate in any political life. We don’t believe in any institutions – government, court, parliament, nothing. This is something extremely dangerous, but at the same time this situation cannot proceed any longer. Everything will just blow up. Perhaps an implosion could mean that something more democratic might emerge and evolve.
Perhaps we are at the darkest time – before dawn.
This interview has been prepared with the support of Journalismfund, within the scope of a broader project concerning just transition in Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and Czechia in a comparative perspective.
Cover photo: a figure of miner in the centre of Pernik. Photo by Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat.
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