Malta’s European Commissioner John Dalli is refusing to shed more light on a $1 billion clean energy project he claimed the government had ignored.

During an interview on Affari Tagħna on One TV last week, Mr Dalli said he recently passed on to the government details of a project he came to know about as Commissioner, which he claimed could bring down the cost of electricity to Maltese consumers by at least 30 per cent.

Hitting out at the government, Mr Dalli accused the Maltese authorities on not giving this project due importance.

However, when asked by The Sunday Times to provide more details about this project, Mr Dalli declined to answer questions and instead said these should be answered by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi.

The Sunday Times requested the name of the consortium and the investors behind it, whether there are other countries involved in the project, and how and when he passed on information to the government.

Mr Dalli’s official spokesman in Brussels said: “Mr Dalli has been in contact with the Prime Minister on this issue over the past months” and “the Prime Minister has all the information”.

Denying Mr Dalli’s allegations that the government was ignoring a billion dollar investment, a government spokesman said investment proposals in the energy sector were regularly received.

“All the proposals are taken seriously and are considered within the strategy of energy generation and evaluated within a context of investment decisions that have already been taken or are committed.”

Replying to a question in Parliament, Finance Minister Tonio Fenech said he was not aware of what Mr Dalli was referring to because he had not specifically mentioned a specific company.

“Maybe it was one of those projects for which no technical documentation had been presented to substantiate the proposal,” Mr Fenech said.

The minister said that several organisations came forward with initial proposals, but when the government expressed interest they added new conditions.