Ukraine’s operational solar capacity reaches 841 MW

Share

Ukraine has reached an operational installed PV power capacity of 841 MW, as of the end of March 2018, according to the adviser to the Head of the State Department of Energy Efficiency, Konstantin Gur, who made the announcement during CISOLAR 2018, held last week in Kiev.

According to a press release from the Ukrainian Ministry of Energy, Gur said that around 100 MW of new solar power stations, installed under the country’s FIT scheme, came online in the first quarter of this year alone. This, Gur stressed, is almost half of all of the renewable energy capacity installed in 2017, of which solar represented around 211 MW.

Gur added that the Ukrainian government is still in the process of introducing an auction mechanism to replace the FIT scheme. “We are convinced that such a change should be balanced, taking into account the dynamics of renewable energy development and economic conditions in the country. Changes should be predictable, understandable and convenient for investors,” he said.

Popular content

This year’s growth is in line with the outlook provided to pv magazine in February by the Ukrainian Association of Renewable Energy (UARE). “It is difficult to make any forecast about the sector’s growth, taking into account the uncertainty with the national energy regulator and with the implementation of the new electricity market model. We expect around 500-700 MW growth of solar PV in 2018,” said Iryna Krymus from the UARE at the time.

The main driver for this growth is a FIT of €0.1502 ($0.1863)/kWh, which the Ukrainian government is granting to ground-mounted PV projects connected to the grid between 2017 and 2019. On the top of its FIT program, the government is also supporting a GW-sized PV project at the area of Chernobyl’s nuclear disaster; and distributed generation projects through net metering.

This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.