EU must change energy priorities: Spain

(SEVILLE) - The European Union must change its budget priorities to finance common objectives in the energy sector and diversify its sources of production and supply, the Spanish EU presidency said Friday.

"Changes in the financial perspective will be needed if we are to achieve the targets set for 2020," Spanish Industry Minister Miguel Sebastian said after chairing a meeting of his EU counterparts in the southern Spanish city of Seville.

Under its ambitious climate plan for 2020, the EU is committed to reducing emissions of greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent compared to 1990 levels, to bringing to 20 percent its share of renewable energy among consumers and to achieving energy savings of 20 percent.

Funding will also be necessary for interconnections in the energy sector to improve the safety of supply and reduce cost, said Sebastian, whose country took over the six-month rotating presidency of the EU on Janaury 1.

"The market is not enough. There needs a little help from public authorities and from the EU to carry out these projects," he said after the meeting of the EU's informal Energy Council.

The EU leaders must decide on a plan of action in the energy sector for the period 2010-2014, and this could be done at a summit in Brussels in March, he said.

Low carbon technologies require significant funding for research and development and the idea of changing the priorities within the EU budget is gaining weight, Sebastian said.

He said 40 percent of expenditure currently goes on the Common Agricultural Policy.

Outoing EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs disagreed.

"It is premature to say it will cut into agricultural or other policies. Cutting here and there is not the right approach, it's wrong."

Piebalgs is be replaced in his post by Germany's Guenther Oettinger and will instead take over Development, an EU portfolio that is also seeking funds in the common budget of the bloc.