A Turkish official from Turkey's Energy Market Regulatory Authority (EMRA) elected to the governing board of Mediterranean Energy Regulators (MEDREG).
Gulefsan Demirbas, the head of strategy development department in Turkey's EMRA, became one of the two new vice presidents of MEDREG with Wijdan Al Rabadi from Jordan's Energy and Minerals Regulatory Commission (EMRC).
Regarding the election Demirbas told that, 'We believe that energy should be a tool for a cooperation rather than conflicts, as our president Recep Tayyip Erdogan asserted in The World Forum on Energy Regulation (WFER) which hold in Istanbul last year. Accordingly, we are regulating the market for the benefit of both consumers and investors. We are working on behalf of all partners in energy market.'
Alexandre Santos, Commissioner in the Portugal's Energy Services Regulatory Authority (ERSE) elected as the new president of MEDREG. ERSE and the Albanian Energy Regulator Authority (ERE) were candidates for the presidency in the election of MEDREG.
“My main priority will be to strengthen MEDREG’s capability to support its members, through tailor-made approaches that address market and regulatory developments and priorities in our countries” Santos said while he is presenting his vision for the association for the two-year term.
MEDREG was inaugurated in 2007 under Italian law and currently gathers 24 energy regulators from 21 Mediterranean countries including, Albania, Algeria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, the Greek Cypriot administration, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Libya, Malta, Montenegro, Morocco, Palestine, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Tunisia and Turkey.
As a member of MEDREG, EMRA acted as the Task Force for the Union of Mediterranean Energy Platforms under the presidency of Egyptian Electric Utility and Consumer Protection Regulatory Agency in MEDREG's previous presidential term.
The association promotes a transparent, stable and harmonized regulatory framework in the Mediterranean region. It fosters market integration and infrastructure investments, and aims to ensure consumer protection and enhance energy cooperation.
MEDREG carries out its activities through a well-structured and effective internal cooperation process and external collaboration with energy stakeholders in the Mediterranean Basin, with the objective of laying the groundwork for the establishment of a future Mediterranean Energy Community, based on a bottom-up approach, according to the association.
The Institution benefits from the support of its members, the European Commission, and the Council of European Energy Regulators (CEER).
By Muhsin Baris Tiryakioglu in Rome
Anadolu Agency
muhsin.tiryakioglu@aa.com.tr