Already major companies like Automobile Dacia and Selgros, as well as mid-sized businesses like Rolmis Slatina and shopping center Lotus Center in Oradea, have decided to put their rooftops to use and become producers of energy through photovoltaic panels.
“All the energy we produce is used by the shopping center. We have put our roof to use, we did not use farmland, nor did we create an imbalance in the national energy system,” representatives of Lotus Center in Oradea told ZF.
When electricity is generated as close as possible to the point of consumption, this limits losses along the transmission grid, avoids overcharging of the national energy system and creates synergy with other industries, such as agriculture, say market specialists.
Wind farm boom puts pressure on the grid
Renewable energy in Romania has attracted investments of EUR4 billion in the past few years and the capacity of wind and solar power stations has increased quickly. Whereas in 2008 there were only a few wind turbines in operation, with a capacity of 6.9 MW, their number had shot up to 2,660 MW installed in wind and solar farms by August 2013. The total capacity of these plants is almost double that of Romania’s nuclear plant in Cernavoda, in the south-east of the country.
But the accelerated development of green energy has put pressure on Romania’s national electricity transmission grid.
Both Energy minister Constantin Nita and representatives of power grid operator Transelectrica have repeatedly warned that Romania’s energy system will not be able to cope with an excessive capacity of renewable energy power stations. In addition, these facilities are concentrated in the south of Romania and the transmission and distribution of energy to consumers in other regions entails losses.
“One of the prospective beneficiaries of the renewable energy policy would be individual consumers. In local communities there is an energy deficit because the transformation substations that supply villages are old,” professor Nicolae Olariu, president of business association SunE, said at an energy conference.
He added that while people have moved from the city to the countryside and consumption in the low-voltage substation network has increased, no investments have been made in modernization of this network.
For instance, in the case of state-managed infrastructure, only 20% of the distribution network has been modernized or built after the fall of communism in 1989, according to representatives of power distributor and supplier Electrica. The bulk of distribution stations are obsolete, which means power is lost along the network and power outages can occur.
“Even if energy can be supplied from Cernavoda or elsewhere, there is no way to get it to consumers because the substations can’t cope. Rather than bring it from Cernavoda, it’s better to produce it there where it is needed for consumption,” Olariu also said.
But apart from rural communities or isolated houses, investing in their own energy production facilities would be a solution for industrial companies, which could cover their consumption from a nearby source. Several such businesses have already seized the advantage of investing in their own energy production both with energy efficiency in mind and in order to benefit from green energy subsidies. One such company is Rolmis Slatina, a producer of aluminum profiles, which this year installed solar panels with a capacity of 0.5 MW on the plant’s rooftop.
However, the segment of rooftop solar panels, with a power of less than 1 MW, is in its early stages in Romania.
Individuals face major obstacles
Individuals who invest in small rooftop panels face high taxes and huge red tape. The procedure entails obtaining a producer’s license from the National Energy Regulatory Authority (ANRE) and joining the electricity distribution grid.
Before making money from the energy generated by their own houses, the owners have to register as sole traders in order to sell their electricity production and take advantage of state subsidies in the form of green certificates.
But all the hassle of paying taxes could be eliminated if the regulatory authority would approve the scheme dedicated to small energy producers, i.e. to those whose panels generate power of less than 1 MW. The legislative framework that supports renewable energy allows small producers to sell the energy they produce to distributors at feed-in tariffs, but the European Commission has not yet been notified about this system, so the system has yet to be implemented.
Energy from waste
An even better resource for generating power and heat than solar power is available to farmers: they make biogas from animal waste. One investor who has seized on the energy potential of waste material is Marin Moraru, owner of the Marex group, which has sales of over EUR150 million from pig farming and meat processing. Moraru has invested EUR6 million in a 2 MW biogas plant fuelled by his pig farm in Gropeni, Braila county. Not only will the investment in the plant reduce the farm’s utility costs, but it will also save the company the cost of removing the waste.
(English version by Daniela Stoican)