Turkey is a slave to the natural gas lobby, according to the economy minister. “Even countries that produce natural gas or have resources do not use the fuel as much as Turkey does in electricity production,” Minister Zafer Çağlayan told the press in Ankara during a Wednesday meeting with business representatives from the Aegean province of İzmir.
“Our energy infrastructure depends on oil and natural gas. Some 52 percent of our electricity production is from natural gas. It is not diversified. Turkey has become a slave to the natural gas lobby,” the minister said.
Turkey consumed 39 billion cubic meters of natural gas in 2009, according to BP’s traditional report on world energy. Only 2.2 percent of the sum was domestic production.
Some 45.9 percent of 211.2 billion kWh Turkey’s electricity production of the country was of natural gas.
The country buys gas from Russia, Iran and Azerbaijan in addition to liquid natural gas from Algeria and Nigeria.
The county has to use all its energy resources to the end initially before heading for nuclear energy and natural gas, he said, adding that Turkey has no other alternative than nuclear energy.
“Those who oppose nuclear energy even do not know what they are against. Do we have any other choice? I’m asking them. Tell me if we have,” he said.
Turkey will produce 85 billion kWh of electricity at its two nuclear power plants to be built, he said. “The cost of producing such an amount from natural gas is $4 billion while it is only $320 million with nuclear power.”
‘Nuclear needed to fight current account gap’
The Turkish economy is in a very good shape but the current account gap is an important problem, Çağlayan said.
The government is working on a strategy to boost exports to fight the problem, he added.
According to the minister Turkey has the potential to increase its imports 10 fold.
Within this scope, the government studied on some 1,273 sectors in 73 countries and compared their imports demand with Turkish items of exports.
“We have analyzed India and saw that Turkey can easily meet 44 percent of the country’s imports. The current account deficit is not fate. It is a problem that we face because what we buy exceeds what we sell.”
The country cannot fight against its current account deficit problem with continuing to produce high amount of electiricty from natural gas, said the minisiter.