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Greek Association of Renewable Electricity Producers

GAREP

The Greek Association of Renewable Electricity Producers (GAREP), founded back in 1997, is the biggest one in Greece and represents over a quarter of the installed RE capacity in Greece, namely more than 1300 MW, and the whole range of commercial RE technologies (wind, PV, small hydro and biomass).

Lobbying Activity

Meeting with Ditte Juul-Joergensen (Director-General Energy) and HELLENIC UNION OF INDUSTRIAL CONSUMERS OF ENERGY

27 Apr 2023 · Energy transition; Other participants: DEPA; DAPEEP; Hellenic Association of Independent Power Companies; DESFA; Hellenic Association of PV Energy Producers; Centre for RES and Savings; Hellenic Energy Exchange; IPTO

Response to Union renewable Financing mechanism

2 Jun 2020

Summary general comments of the Greek Association of RES Electricity Producers (GAREP) on the draft Regulation for a new EU-wide RES financing mechanism 1. As the new mechanism is primarily constructed as an EU-wide RES financing tool to be used for the benefit of its Member States and citizens, the participation of third countries (as possible RES project hosts) should be examined carefully, on a case basis; it should, in general, be limited and should only concern third countries respecting the Community energy acquis communautaire, such as, for example, the countries of the Energy Community. 2. All Member States should be given the same opportunities, as well as fair and equitable access to this new RES financing tool. If projects in different Member States are to compete on equal footing with each other, then individual Member State parameters that are not controlled by the project promoters should be internalized in the calls, so as to establish a level-playing field for competition among all project promoters. Such parameters may include (a) Financing scarcity, cost, security and terms, (b) Administrative and market participation costs, (c) Taxation, (d) Grid connection costs (construction and use), (e) Environmental terms, etc. 3. As the European Commission will be responsible for this financing mechanism and for the attractiveness of its calls to Member States and project promoters, always to the benefit of the Union and its citizens, it should ensure high participation in this new financing mechanism and its effective functioning. Thus, it is crucial to secure that it is offered under attractive terms and conditions, while also (a) providing the Member States with additional incentives (e.g. the financing of a minimum amount of support for each project with Union funds, and this part to be statistically allocated to the host Member States, not to the Union’s target), and, (b) providing more transparency and more detail regarding all stages of the functioning of the mechanism and, in particular, those stages preceding the binding commitments and the deposit of the participation payment by the Member States. 4. The Draft Implementing Regulation must include specific provisions to safeguard the viability of the calls and the benefits of all involved parties, namely the contributing Member States, the host Member State(s) and the project promoters. More specifically, since the ceiling price of each call is announced only after the binding commitment of the host Member State (Article 8), there should be protection of this Member State in case the ceiling price is very low and excludes national companies from participating in the call. The successful participation of a minimum number of companies from the host country is highly desirable in all these EU calls, in order to increase acceptance, local value and speedy realization of a winning project. 5. The development and setting up of both the eligibility and the selection criteria in an EU call under the new mechanism should be clarified / elaborated further. For example, what should be the minimum (licensing) maturity of a project that will be allowed to participate in the call? Or, should there be other selection criteria, besides the bidding price? Should environmental criteria be set in case of equal bidding prices? 6. It is not clear if and how crucial RES enabler projects, such as: a) storage, b) grid reinforcement/upgrading/expansion, and c) interconnection with RES-rich remote regions and islands, fit in this new programme. Such RES enabler projects are usually of paramount importance to the host country, and they should be strongly supported by the new mechanism; otherwise the winning projects, under the mechanism’s calls, would place a heavy burden on the host country to finance their supporting infrastructure (connection costs, costs of required grid reinforcement, costs of additional storage capacity needed, etc.), especially under grid-saturation.
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Meeting with Dominique Ristori (Director-General Energy)

16 Jun 2017 · Energy policy