Poland

The Shanghai-based project developer – which will soon relocate to the U.S. – says the profit margins are not high enough in those markets and has cancelled its project pipeline in the nations. The company has also changed its CEO after less than five months and is on a drive to reduce capital costs.

In this year’s tender, which is open to PV and wind projects with a generation capacity of more than 1 MW, solar may have better prospects after securing only 1 MW in last year’s exercise. The Energy Regulatory Office also announced the auction for sub-1 MW projects will be held on December 10.

Grid operator Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne has published figures demonstrating the country had 1,007.2 MW of solar at the end of September, with 600 MW of new PV coming online in the first nine months of the year. The Polish government expects total capacity to reach 1.3 GW this year.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development is lending €250 million for a project which has expanded from producing an initial 100,000 EV batteries per year to an hoped-for 1 million by 2022, creating 1,000 new jobs along the way.

Economic thinktank Carbon Tracker used financial modeling to determine the profitability of every coal power plant in the EU. On average, 79% of the facilities run at a loss, with Germany, Spain and Czechia among the states particularly exposed to the consequences – for coal investors and the public.

Poland’s fourth largest energy company, Enea, will build a 30 MW solar plant for the Bogdanka coal mine in which the utility is majority shareholder. The project will sell power to the mine through a long-term supply deal.

The advent of permitting restrictions on wind power projects has opened the door for PV in the pending auction for renewable generation facilities with a capacity of more than 1 MW. Wind power dominates Polish clean energy and no solar projects were successful in last year’s exercise.

The Polish parliament has adopted new environmental provisions which also include a tax reduction for micro PV. The measure comes on top of the Mój Prąd rebate scheme for residential rooftop projects ranging in size from 2 kW to 10 kW which was launched in July.

Europe’s coal powerhouse is making progress in the deployment of renewable energy and it appears that the nation’s banks are beginning to see the value of clean-power investment.

A 600 MW project will be built on degraded land by a Polish investment fund and utility PGE has agreed to build a 500 MW facility for one of the country’s largest energy intensive companies – copper and silver producer KGHM Polska Miedź.