The energy ministries of Bulgaria and Romania have both revealed the results of EU-backed tenders for renewables and energy storage, with gigawatts of energy storage being supported.
Bulgaria supports 3.1GW of renewables and 1.1GW of storage
The Ministry of Energy revealed the results last week (2 November) for the EU-backed tender, which opened in August and will provide financial support to over 300 renewable and energy storage projects, covering up to 50% of construction costs.
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The first call for projects was for those between 200kW to 2MW in size, either renewable generation or energy storage. Some 200 projects won a total of BGN107 million (US$60 million) in that call, adding up to 435MW of renewables and 176MW of energy storage.
The second call was for those over 200kW with no upper limit. In that call, 2,660MW of renewable projects won funding while 1,000MW of energy storage projects were successful, spread across 65 projects winning a total of 427.5 million (US$238 million).
All in all, 3,095MW of renewables projects and 1,176MW of energy storage projects won in the tender. Projects will need to be operational by 31 March, 2026.
The funding comes from Bulgaria’s portion of the EU-wide Recovery and Resilience facility, the bloc’s scheme to help countries mitigate the negative economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The facility has also supported energy storage deployments in Romania, Finland and Greece, while the separate Temporary Crisis and Transition Framework (‘TCTF’) has supported projects in Poland, Hungary and Slovenia.
Just a few days after the Bulgarian ministry’s announcement, Romania revealed the results of one of its support schemes.
Romania provides grants to 1.5GWh of storage projects and solar PV facilities
Also using the Recovery and Resilience facility, the Ministry of Energy of Romania has awarded grants to a handful of energy storage projects.
Minister of Energy Sebastian Burduja yesterday (4 November) signed off some €30 million of support for five battery energy storage system (BESS) projects totalling 791.48MWh. They are:
- Aukera Project Company Delta’s 299.75 MWh project in Gura Ialomiței, Ialomița county, which received €9.9 million
- Baboia Solar Plant’s 121.92 MWh project in Ogrezeni, Giurgiu county, which received €6 million
- HQ Plus’s 79.24 MWh project in Sânpaul commune, Mureș county, which received €4.3 million
- Energy Capital Group’s 199.13 MWh project in the village of Iaz, Caraș-Severin county, which received €10.7 million
- HQ Curat’s 91.44 MWh project in Sânpaul commune, Mureș county, which received €4.9 million
However, the Ministry’s announcement added that another 13 projects totalling 1,757MWh have been sent pre-contracting notices for a total support of €73.8 million, so the total capacity supported should grow to around 2.5GWh.
Just yesterday, Energy-Storage.news reported on a 2GWh BESS for which an environmental permit is being sought by its developer, independent power producer (IPP) Monsson.
The double helping of news from the region comes a month after Solar Media’s Energy Storage Summit Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) 2024 in Warsaw, Poland, which looked at the major drivers, opportunities and regulatory and market challenges for storage in CEE.
The Romanian ministry’s announcement also included support for solar PV manufacturing, including €32.9 million for a 1.5GW solar panel factory in Barlad, Vaslui county, being built by SC Heliomit.
