Litouwse premier en minister van Buitenlandse Zaken roepen op tot meer samenwerking energiezekerheid Baltische Zee regio (en)

Today, the European Commission’s in house science service, the Joint Research Centre (JRC), and the Lithuanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs are holding the conference “Scientific support to energy security in the Baltic Sea Region” at the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences in Vilnius. The conference is an event of the Lithuanian Presidency of the Council of the EU.

In his address to the participants of the conference, the Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevičius i emphasized the importance of the dialogue between scientists, business leaders, and policy-makers in addressing energy security challenges, and called for joined up scientific potential in the Baltic region. Butkevičius also underlined that the Baltic Prime Ministers expressed interest in further development of the Baltic Energy Security Research Platform, the driving force behind which was cooperation between researchers in all the interested countries.

During his welcome speech, the Lithuanian Minister of Foreign Affairs Linas Linkevičius noted that energy security was a priority for Lithuania and the entire European Union.

“Lithuania’s Presidency of the EU Council will focus on these key objectives: the creation of the European internal energy market, development of energy infrastructure projects, and strengthening of the EU dialogue with external energy resources suppliers,” said the Foreign Minister.

According to Linkevičius, science is the engine of progress that will propel both energy diversification and innovative use of science and technology. The Foreign Minister welcomed the popular idea to increase support for research cooperation in the field of energy security and to engage researchers and representatives of various institutions and businesses in the work of the Baltic Energy Security Research Platform. The Foreign Minister believes that this would be an important step forward in addressing the emerging common energy security challenges in the region.

The conference is keen to build on tangible results from the debates launched in November 2012 and collaboration between government, business and academia. It is also one of the first events of the Lithuanian Presidency of the EU Council that is being held in Vilnius.

The conference is attended by the Minister of Education and Science Dainius Pavalkis, Vice-Minister of Energy Aleksandras Spruogis, Director-General of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) Dominique Ristori, as well as stakeholders from government, science and energetics of the Baltic region, Members of the European Parliament, officials of the European Commission, and other guests.