Poland contracts over 700 MW of small solar PV in last auction of 2020

Poland has contracted enough energy in its last renewables auction for the year to support the construction of more than 700 MW small-scale solar photovoltaic (PV) plants.

The country’s Energy Regulatory Office, or URE, announced the results on Friday, saying that 99.9% of the allocated energy was sold in the auction, or 11.75 TWh to be precise. Successful bids were made by 235 parties, while 590 different producers took part in the competitive process with a total of 1,618 bids. No onshore wind offers emerged.

The lowest price at which energy was sold amounted to PLN 222.87 (USD 60.38/EUR 49.51) per MWh. The total value of the contracted power is estimated at more than PLN 3 billion, which is 67% of the possible support.

The regulator also summarised the results of all eight auctions held in Poland during 2020, pointing out that half of them were successful, while the other four did not attract the required number of submitted bids. In total, 54.5 TWh of electricity was sold, with a total value of nearly PLN 12.9 billion.

All of this may lead to the construction of over 1.56 GW of solar PV parks, nearly 0.93 GW of new wind farms and slightly over 4 MW of new capacity from other renewable energy technologies.

Rafal Gawin, president of URE, noted that this year’s auctions outlined a substantial slowdown in the development of new wind projects because of distance limitations. He explained that the suitable locations with favourable wind speeds, social and environmental features, and relatively low connection costs, have already been exhausted.

(PLN 1.0 = USD 0.271/EUR 0.222)

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