North Macedonia launches solar tenders for 35 MW of capacity

The government of North Macedonia has announced a tendering process for 62 MW of utility scale solar projects on public land.

A first tender is for the construction of several plants with a combined capacity of 25 MW in the municipality of Sveti Nikole, in the north of the country. Another 10 MW of project capacity will be tendered in Makedonski Brod, in central North Macedonia.

“In order to meet the needs of all investors, the parcels to be built are divided into different sizes,” said deputy prime minister for economic affairs Koco Angjushev. “There are plots on which it will be possible to build photovoltaic power plants of 10 MW, 5 MW, 2 MW and 1 MW. We have already finalized a negotiation with the operator of the distribution network whereby an attractive price of €20,000-30,000 for grid connection was agreed upon for each investor.”

Selected projects will secure a feed-in premium tariff that tops up the market energy price when required.

Private land tender

Angjushev said a second tender for 27 MW of PV project capacity on private land will be launched in the weeks ahead.

The procurement rounds are expected to mobilize investment of €50 million, added the deputy PM.

The country’s first tender for large scale solar was launched by state owned electric company Elektrani na Makedonija in April and will see the utility build a 10 MW project partly financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The new facility will be next to North Macedonia’s second thermal power plant, which produces around 10% of the country’s electricity. The EBRD agreed to back the project with €5.9 million in January.

North Macedonia has installed PV capacity of just 18 MW, most of which is in the form of distributed generation. Thermal power plants account for 842 MW of the nation’s power generation capacity of 1.41 GW, with hydroelectricity and wind accounting for 553.6 MW and 36.8 MW, respectively.