Govt official: Achieving climate goals should go hand in hand with lower energy prices

The European Union should focus on curbing energy prices and ensuring energy supply alongside achieving its climate goals for 2050, a government official said on Wednesday in Luxembourg. Speaking to MTI on the sidelines of a meeting of EU environment ministers, Attila Steiner, a state secretary of the innovation and technology ministry, said the EU should "proceed cautiously" when striving for climate goals. Hasty implementation could lead to rocketing energy prices and even to energy outages, he said. Noting that several EU states were mulling introducing centralised energy prices, Steiner said the Hungarian government's utility price cuts had curbed the costs of green transition and maintained a secure energy supply.