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Hungary Energy
Chronic coal-mining problems and shrinking domestic
hydrocarbon reserves have plagued the economy since the
mid1970s . The reliance on imported energy increased steadily
from
37.2 percent in 1970 to 51.3 percent in 1986. The Soviet
Union
furnished most of Hungary's energy imports, but Soviet
production
setbacks and demands for better trade terms complicated
Hungary's
energy supply problems after the mid-1980s. Analysts
expected the
Soviet Union to demand more and better-quality goods from
Hungary
in exchange for its energy exports in the 1990s
(see Relations with the Soviet Union
, ch. 4).
Hungary slashed investment in coal mining in the late
1960s
and 1970s, when Soviet oil and natural gas were less
expensive
alternate fuels. Consequently, coal's share of domestic
energy
production dropped from 62.7 percent in 1970 to 36.6
percent in
1986. Coal accounted for about 26 percent of Hungary's
energy
consumption. In the early 1980s, rising oil and natural
gas
prices prompted Hungary to reopen the flow of investment
into
coal mining but the country still suffered from a severe
shortage
of miners, and its mines were unable to keep pace with
rising
demand. The government approved substantial pay increases
for
miners in order to attract new workers. In 1986 Hungary's
mines
employed 79,566 workers who labored between sixty and
seventy
hours per week and produced coal worth about US$779
million.
Total annual coal output has hovered around 24 million
tons since
1975, but hard-coal production actually fell by about 23
percent
between 1975 and 1986, and the calorific value of coal
output
declined by about 18 percent in the same period. Coal,
coke, and
briquette imports totaled US$268 million in 1986.
Hydrocarbons, including oil, propane, natural gas, and
gasoline, accounted for 61 percent of total energy
consumption in
1986. Natural-gas production has increased considerably
since the
mid-1960s, exceeding 7 billion cubic meters in 1986 and
1987.
Domestic consumption, however, has far outstripped
production
since 1970, nearly doubling from 5.9 billion cubic meters
in 1975
to 11.5 billion in 1986. Hungary's wells supplied about
94.8
percent of its natural-gas consumption in 1970 but only
66.1
percent in 1986. Natural-gas imports totaled 4.8 billion
cubic
meters in 1986 and cost about US$366 million. The Soviet
Union
supplied Hungary with about 90 percent of its natural-gas
imports.
Hungarian wells have pumped about 2 million tons of
crude oil
yearly since 1975, mostly from the Szeged region, but
observers
expected production to decline after 1990. Oil imports
totaled
US$1.1 billion in 1986, while exports added up to about
US$332
million. Hungary exported oil by reselling Iranian and
other
Middle Eastern oil acquired in various compensation
schemes.
Hungary launched an energy rationalization program in
the
early 1980s aimed at maintaining levels of domestic oil
and gas
production attained in the mid-1980s, increasing
exploration, and
substituting natural gas and other fuels for oil. The
conservation program, backed by stiff price hikes, netted
positive results. Oil consumption dipped from 12.5 million
tons
in 1979 to 9.1 million tons in 1985, and Hungary's imports
of
petroleum and petroleum products dropped from about US$1.3
billion in 1985 to US$1.1 billion in 1986.
Hungary's power plants had a 6.8-billion-kilowatt
capacity in
1986 and generated 28 billion kilowatts of electricity,
almost
double the amount generated in 1970. The increase failed,
however, to keep pace with demand as consumption rose from
17.9
billion kilowatts in 1970 to 38.6 billion in 1986. Hungary
overcame the 1986 shortfall by importing 11.9 billion
kilowatts
of electricity. Transmission lines from the Soviet Union
carried
about one-third of Hungary's imported electricity.
In the late 1980s, thermal power stations generated 70
percent of Hungary's electricity and burned about 65
percent of
Hungary's brown coal production and nearly all of its
lignite
output. Hungary has constructed large thermal power
stations in
the last 15 years, including a 1.9-million-kilowatt heat
and
power plant at Szazhalombatta in Pest County that
generated
almost 40 percent of the country's electricity.
Southern Hungary's uranium reserves supplied the
880-million-kilowatt Paks nuclear power plant in Tolna
County,
the country's only nuclear power facility. The plant's
first
reactor went on line in 1983, and its second followed a
year
later. In 1986 the plant generated 7.4 billion kilowatts,
or
about 26.5 percent of the nation's electricity output and
19.2
percent of its consumption. Hungary and the Soviet Union
agreed
in 1986 to build four additional 440-megawatt reactors at
Paks in
the next decade. Officials hoped that the plant would
supply
about 40 percent of Hungary's electricity by the early
2000s.
In the late 1980s, Hungary's hydroelectric power
stations
generated less than 1 percent of the country's
electricity, but
Hungary has joined with Czechoslovakia to build two
hydroelectric
power stations on the Danube at Gabcikovo in
Czechoslovakia and
at Nagymaros in Hungary. The project, which was scheduled
for
completion by 1993, received Austrian financial assistance
(see Relations with Other Communist Neighbors
, ch. 4). However,
in May
1989 the Hungarian government suspended work on the power
station
because of public concern over the damage it threatened to
cause
to the environment. The power stations' total projected
capacity
was 3.6 billion kilowatts per year, and their estimated
cost was
US$1.4 billion.
Data as of September 1989
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