Restrictions might be imposed on local heating systems

Autonomous heating systems have been installed in about 15% of the apartments in Chisinau. In Balti, this figure is 28%. As a result, the charges on central heating go up, said officials of the Ministry of Economy, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. In Balti, one gigacalorie of heat costs over 900 lei, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy Valeriu Lazar said in a roundtable meeting. As more and more consumers set up individual heating systems, the process of supplying heat in a centralized way is affected. Some of the dwellings are heated adequately, while others inadequately. Difficulties appear at the start of the heating season, when the air must be released from pipes. “As the number of apartments disconnected from the central heating system increases, the nonuniform distribution of the costs for heating common places in buildings becomes more accentuated. The number of persons who want to install individual boilers rises proportionally,” said Sergiu Puscuta, one of the authors of the presented analysis. The study contains proposals for stopping the disconnections from the central heating system. One of them is to increase the taxes paid by the apartment owners with local systems for heating the common places by 5% to 30%. Another proposal is for the applicant to obtain the approval of all the dwellers before being disconnected. CET-Nord director Petru Axenti said the uncontrolled disconnections from the central heating system cause damage to the consumers. “It is not right for 15% of the consumers to enjoy privileges as the other 85% will never be able to install local heating systems and boilers. I think we must solve the problem by winter,” Petru Axenti said. Valentin Arion, a teacher of the Technical University of Moldova, said that despite the objections raised by the consumers, the services provided by the heat suppliers SA Termocom and CET –Nord have improved considerably during the last few years. Besides, it is not true that autonomous heating is cheaper. Valentin Arion said he is against increasing the taxes paid by the disconnected consumers. “Several years ago, we urged these consumers to instal individual boilers and they invested money. We cannot force them now to pay more,” he said. Chisinau councilor Oleg Cernei disapproved of the proposal to raise taxes for the disconnected users. “The managers of energy companies were aware of the possible consequences of mass disconnections from the central system. They tacitly accepted their requests and now want to recover their losses, making the consumers suffer the consequences. They should improve the services provided so that the people do not want to instal local systems,” said the councilor. The roundtable meeting was organized by the Ministry of Economy. The specialists will hold more meetings to try to identify solutions to this problem.