Giant solar project under development in Romania

The government of the Arad county, in the region of Crișana in western Romania, has started a public consultation on a large-scale solar project that is planned to be spread across the municipalities of Grăniceri and Pilu.

According to a document published on the municipality’s website, the project is being proposed by the company S.C. West Power Investment Srl and is expected to be built on a surface of 1,079 hectares. Romanian newspaper Adevarul has revealed that a group of international investors is behind this company, without providing further details.

The solar plant will have a capacity of 700 MW and will require an investment of approximately €700 million.

The project is likely being conceived to take advantage of the recent introduction of more favorable rules for power purchase agreements. On the other hand, no direct or indirect incentives are currently being awarded to large-scale solar in the country.

The only utility-scale PV projects currently under development are those of Romania’s Complexul Energetic Oltenia (CE Oltenia), which wants to deploy 310 MW at one of its coal power facilities. The company is now seeking consultants to conduct feasibility studies to build four facilities, which are part of its restructuring efforts and decarbonization plan. According to Romanian media sources, the four projects will span 595 hectares, and their capacities will range from 60 MW to 95 MW.

According to the International Renewable Energy Agency, the country had installed about 1.38 GW of solar at the end of 2019. Most of this capacity comes from megawatt-scale PV plants built under the country’s now-expired green certificates scheme. Green certificates were only granted to companies that connected their PV projects to the grid before Jan. 31, 2016.