SOFIA (Bulgaria), April 3 (SeeNews) – German energy company n-vision energy plans to build two wind farms approximately worth up to 300 million euro ($400.6 million) in Bulgaria in the next couple of years, the company’s managing director said.
The company plans to build a wind farm comprising 47 wind turbines, with a capacity of two to three megawatts (MW) each, near the southwestern town of Kyustendil, and another one with a total capacity of around 100 MW in Karnobat, in the southeast, Sebastian Noethlichs told SeeNews in a recent interview.
“The investment volume [of the Kyustendil project] roughly, if you multiply the number of megawatts by 1.25 million euro, will be between 110 million and 170 million euro,” Noethlichs said. The investment in the Karnobat project will be around 125 million euro, respectively, he added.
The project in the southwest, 15 kilometres north of Kyustendil, is in an advanced stage as the company is waiting to sign a final contract for the municipal land where the turbines will stand.
“The indication we’ve got from the municipality is that by the end of May this process should be completed,” Noethlichs said. “After that we have to take it [the project] through the permissions process, we have been working on it for approximately one year already […] If things go smoothly from hereon forwards we can hope to begin construction in the autumn of 2010 and hopefully finish most infrastructure construction before the winter of 2010.”
If the project runs according to schedule, the wind farm could become operational at the end of the first quarter of 2011.
The project in Karnobat, some 50 kilometres west of the Black Sea port city of Burgas, goes through a different process as there is public tender, in which n-vision energy takes part. For the project, the company has teamed up with Danish wind farms developer Global Wind Power.
“We are one of, what we understand, two remaining companies in this tender process,” Noethlichs said, adding that the municipality will most probably come up with a decision in May.
“We hope the process will be faster because a lot of the work has been done by the municipality already,” Noethlichs said. The wind farm could become operational or partially operational by the end of 2010, he added.
N-vision energy is also considering other locations for similar projects and is also mulling starting solar park projects in Bulgaria but these plans are in an early stage, Noethlichs said.
Around September the company will set up a solar energy department to deal with solar parks exclusively.
N-vision energy (www.n-vision.biz) is part of Noethlichs’ family business. The family’s renewable energy business started more than 15 years ago with headquarters in Germany. N-vision energy has been active in Bulgaria since 2007. The company has developed renewable energy projects with a combined capacity of more than 900 MW worth over 1.0 billion euro in total across Europe.
($ = 0.749 euro)
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