2012 month by month in Romania - March: energy news, Romanian car industry on show in Geneva, MP flees to Africa

March was a fairly quiet month on the political front. With the benefit of 20:20 hindsight, it was the proverbial calm before the political storm, which dominated headlines for the rest of the year once it broke. Romania's burgeoning car industry was in the news; Ford unveiled the new B-Max model at the Geneva car show and started hiring for planned production in mid-2012. Local car manufacturer Dacia also launched its new Lodgy model on the world stage at the Swiss car show. Ford unveils new B-Max model to be produced in Romania Romanian producer Dacia launches EUR 9,500 Lodgy model at Geneva motor show It's been a great year for Romanian film and the country's new wave of daring directors continue to gain international recognition for their work, but in March one of the landmarks in Romanian film was shown in a retrospective at New York's MoMA modern art museum. Lucian Pintilie's 1968 masterpiece Reenactment/Reconstituirea is a sublimely subversive, darkly humorous and moving portrayal of petty bureaucracy attacking the human spirit. New York's MoMA wants classic Romanian film 'Reenactment' for permanent collection Plenty of energy news in March; after the discovery of natural gas in the Black Sea Neptune perimeter in February, representatives of US oil and gas company Chevron met President Traian Basecu to discuss extracting shale gas in Romania. The the induced hydraulic fracturing (fracking) technique used to extract shale gas has caused controversy across Europe. Romania gave Chevron the green light for exploration in Constanta County at the end of the month, but plans were later put on hold pending the results of European environmental impact studies. PM Victor Ponta recently suggested that shale gas projects could soon begin. There has been something of a shale gas boom in the US in recent years and more and more politicians across Europe are being seduced by the economic potential of the technique. Chevron meets Romanian PM to talk about drilling for shale gas Chevron gets green light for shale gas exploration in Romania’s seaside county Renewable energy projects are popping up all over the place in Romania and in March energy company GDF Suez announced a EUR 75 million investment in a wind farm in Romania. Italian energy firm Enel also announced EUR 330 million investments in Romanian wind farms in 2011 as well as plans for significant future investments in wind energy in the country.