Innovative Business Centre: Ukraine is Expected to Install 3 GW of Solar Power Facilities by 2020

KIEV, Ukraine: The capacity of installed solar energy facilities in Ukraine will increase up to 3 GW by 2020. Vitaliy Daviy, CEO of IB Center Europe, made such forecast for the development of the industry at CISOLAR 2019 the 8th Solar Energy Conference in Kiev.

As of April 1, 2019, more than 2.2 GW of solar energy facilities have been installed in Ukraine – this is 71% of all existing renewable energy sources.

The active development of the industry allowed Ukraine to go up from 34th to 23rd position in the solar energy global ranking.

Vitaliy Daviy, CEO at IB Centre Europe

“Between the events CISOLAR 2019 and CISOLAR 2020 we are waiting for the installation of 1 GW of solar energy facilities in Ukraine. A new legislative basis for auctions will be implemented, which will open guaranteed prospects for investors for the next long period of time (5-10 years), and the rules of the game will again be clear and even more investments will flow to Ukraine,” – Vitaliy Daviy made a positive forecast.

The State Agency on Energy Efficiency of Ukraine noted that Ukraine has a high feed-in tariff which needs to be settled in a market-driven way that is through “green” auctions. Indeed, such a system will provide a fair market price for “green” electricity, transparent competition in the market, stable development of “clean” energy and guarantees to investors and financial institutions regarding project implementation.

“The price should be fixed based on the auction system. At the same time, the investor should be protected,” said the Head of the State Agency on Energy Efficiency Sergey Savchuk.

Let us recall that the relevant law on green auctions was adopted on April 25, 2019. According to this law, the participation in auctions will be mandatory with effect from 2020 for solar power projects with a capacity exceeding 1 MW and wind power stations with a capacity exceeding 5 MW. Under the terms of the auction, the one who offers the lowest price will be able to sell “clean” electricity to the state.

Yevhen Metsger, Deputy Chairman of the Board of JSB Ukrgasbank, showed positive results in the alternative energy financing sector. According to him, Ukrgasbank has funded 146 green energy projects, including 106 solar projects with total capacity of 688 MW, worth 527 million euros. As for home solar power plants, 190 SPP were funded for a total amount of 65 million UAH.

Industry experts have discussed not only promising opportunities for the development of solar energy in Ukraine, but have also revealed the risks Ukraine is facing on the path towards the effective development. In “Ukrenergo” they are concerned about the problem of balancing the energy system, since more technical requirements have been issued than this system can accept.

To the question “What will happen to the solar power industry next year?” Vsevolod Kovalchuk, director of SE NPC Ukrenergo, replied that it would already be impossible to hold auctions, attract investors and build new balancing fast capacities that would allow to smooth out fluctuations in the production of poorly predicted power generation. He commented on the matter:

“Starting from next year, Ukrenergo, as a system operator, will be forced to either restrict the power generation of nuclear power plants, or limit (where technically possible) the power generation of renewable energy facilities. Because we must ensure the security of the energy supply.”

China is the global market leader in solar energy. This was announced at the CISOLAR 2019 Conference by Pranav Mehta, Chairman of the Global Solar Council. He shared his experience and gave some advice to Ukraine to accelerate the development of solar energy:

“Ukraine has the potential and as a result, the question arises: how to learn from the experience of other countries, in particular India, China, the United States and how it can help. First of all, you need to have a huge desire in order to satisfy the need to attain 3 gigawatts, because Ukraine has a high potential for this. At the same time, I am happy that there are more and more home solar power stations in Ukraine, which is good, but their number should grow. It is important.”

Following the CISOLAR 2019 Conference, a draft of a new strategy aimed at achieving 100% renewable energy, including solar, in the overall energy balance of Ukraine was announced.

“A strategy is needed that will unite business, society and the state. 100% RES is our big goal. The cost of electricity after 2030 will be reduced,” Sergiy Shakalov, the CEO at KNESS, determined the industry development direction.

Philipp Leckebusch, the CEO at DTEK Renewables, noted that Ukraine is now at the stage of development of solar energy which Europe passed 7-10 years ago. At the same time, Ukraine offers one of the most attractive investment structures in Europe for the development of the industry. Indeed, favorable conditions were created here: availability of resources and land plots, feed-in tariff, government support and a targeted energy strategy – the objective to reach 25% of clean energy production by 2035.

CISOLAR 2019 gathered over 450 participants representing big business and small and medium sized businesses. The solar energy market is the market of the right economic platform that creates equal opportunities for participants of any scale.

“I am pleased that CISOLAR is a platform for all of them. Definitely, we are writing a new page for the development of the solar industry in Ukraine, because there are a lot of difficult and not simple issues in terms of legislative initiatives, further policies, technological constraints, and so on. It is expected that CISOLAR 2020 will be an even bigger event and we will discuss fundamentally different topics: what are the technological constraints for the implementation of new projects,” said Vitaly Daviy, the CEO at IB Center.

CISOLAR 2019, the 8th International Conference and Trade Show of Solar Energy in Central and Eastern Europe, the main industry event, took place on April 16-18. The event was attended by over 450 delegates, 56 speakers from 30 countries, more than 100 companies that introduced the latest equipment, innovative technologies and unique solutions, as well as over 4,000 visitors of the exhibition. At the business conference, supporters of the solar industry discussed all the most pressing issues regarding legislation, financing, prospects, risks of the industry development, its features and vision of solar energy in the future for effective and confident progress.

The organizer and producer of CISOLAR 2019 is Innovative Business Centre (IB Centre).

The coming up industry event from IB Center – SEF 2019 KYIV, the 11th International Sustainable Energy Forum and Trade Show of Central and Eastern European will be held in Kiev, on October 16-18, 2019.

To learn more about the main event in the field of sustainable energy and to register for SEF 2019 KYIV, visit sefkyiv.com/, call: +38-044-383-03-56 or contact us at e-mail: sef@ibcentre.org

Source: Innovative Business Centre