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Italy to hold first 500 MW renewables auction on September 30

The Italian Ministry of Economic Development (MiSE) has signed the decree implementing the new auction and incentive scheme for solar and renewable energies, which the European Commission had approved in mid-June.

According to the auction schedule included in the provisions, which are yet to be published in the Italian official journal, the first procurement exercise is planned to be held on September 30. Three additional procurement exercises are scheduled to occur in 2020 on January 31, May 31, and September 30. Another three rounds are set to occur on the same dates in 2021.

These seven rounds of tenders will be the country’s first set of auctions for large-scale renewable energy projects since the FIT program Conto Energia was closed in 2013. The Italian government plans to allocate approximately 4.8 GW of total power generation capacity under the newly announced projects. The first two procurement rounds will each see around 500 MW of capacity allocated. In rounds three to five, each tender will assign 700 MW. For the final two bids, the contracted capacity will reach 800 MW.

Auctions will be open to projects exceeding 1 MW in size and will exclude agricultural projects, forcing developers to plan their facilities unused surfaces in urban or industrial areas.

The signed decree also includes smaller tenders for renewable energy projects under 1 MW in size, totaling 650 MW for solar and wind, and 700 MW is earmarked for PV projects linked to the removal of asbestos covers.

Italy is planning to install around 50 GW of installed solar generation capacity by 2030. Currently, it has about 20 GW of operational solar power.

Source: pv magazine