By Sami Zaptia.
Tripoli, 31 May 2013:
At Wednesday’s Prime Ministerial press conference, Electricity Minister Ali Muhairig said that there needs to be increased . . .[restrict]public awareness with regards to the responsible use of energy.
Muhairig said that with the onset of high temperatures in the middle of summer he expected demand for energy to rise. He also pointed out that whatever oil or gas Libya wasted through uneconomical or inefficient use of energy locally, it fails to export and loses possible revenues to invest in other sectors. This is costing the nation “billions”, added the Minister.
In this regard, he announced that his Ministry was launching an awareness campaign to encourage people to use energy prudently.
The authorities had attempted a similar measure last year by installing a real-time live consumption dial on television screens. The idea was that when the public saw that the dial was in the red, they would turn something off, rather than lose electricity completely.
Ultimately, as long as electricity is heavily subsidized and cheap, it will be much more difficult to get the public to use electricity more sensibly. An adjustment of electricity tariffs would probably be the best disincentive for the wasteful consumption of electricity. [/restrict]
