Small producers in Romania, unhappy with changes to law on green energy

Romania’s Energy Ministry plans to change Law 220 from 2008, which sets the support scheme for the renewable energy sector. However, the changes proposed by the ministry, following public consultation with the industry’s representatives, will favor large international companies in the wind energy sector but will bankrupt the small and medium-sized producers, especially those in the photovoltaic energy sector, according to the Employers' Organization of Producers of Renewable Energy in Romania (PATRES), reports local News.ro. The organization demands equitable solutions for all producers in the renewables sector. After a public consultation, the Energy Ministry has recently published the draft bill for amending the law that establishes the support system for the production of energy from renewable sources. According to the draft bill, wind energy producers will continue to get one green certificate instead of two for each MWh of electricity produced, until March 2017, while solar energy producers will only get two green certificates instead of four, until end-2024. According to law 220 from 2008, wind energy producers should get 2 green certificates for each MWh of electricity they produce and solar energy producers should get 4 green certificates. The support scheme was reduced to half by the Ponta Government in 2013. The reduced scheme should have applied until end-2016 and starting 2017 both wind energy producers and solar energy producers should have received the full number of certificates plus the certificates they haven’t received in the past three and a half years. editor@romania-insider.com