Producers of renewable energy ask the authorities to give up overtaxing revenue  

The Romanian Association for Wind Energy (RWEA), the Employers’ Organisation of Renewable Energy Producers of Romania (PATRES) and the Association for Photovoltaic Industry in Romania (RPIA) require the authorities to give up the measure of over taxing by 80% of the revenue made by the electricity producers, as well as the measure to suspend for a period of one year green certificates, not to endanger the production of green energy.   The representatives of RWEA, PATRES, RPIA together with WindEurope and SolarPower Europe notified the authorities in Bucharest and Bruxelles regarding the impact the two measures have on the energy safety of Romania and on the price of electricity, in the context where the cost of energy from renewable sources is the lowest in comparison to the other sources of energy.   As a result of the legislative changes regarding the reduction of the support scheme through green certificates, the producers of renewable industry recorded significant financial losses between 2014 and 2018, losses worth between 1.2 – 2 billion euro per year, according to the site www.mfinante.ro for CAEN code 3511 – production of electricity. According to a study made by the international company for financial auditing , the losses made by the producers in the wind industry are ove 5.58 billion lei, during the same period 2014-2018.   The new proposal taken into consideration by the Romanian authorities will increase the negative financial impact by the reduction of the reference price on the wholesale market from 450 lei/MWh to 300 lei/MWH and the use of the same percentage of 80% on the respective revenue, impact which at present is already very high for these producers.   Complementary to the two measures there is the absence of the formula for calculating the additional tax from the beginning of its application, i.e. November 2021. This tax, which has been applied for at least one and a half years, runs counter to the climate change objectives of the European Union and Romania.    The producers of renewable energy ensured almost 30% of the end consumption of electricity in Romania over the last months and had a major contribution to the reduction of the price of energy on these markets over the last months. The representatives of the associations speak about the fact that the measures are counter to the recommendations of the European Commission, which through the toolbox issued on 13th October 2021 proposes finding alternative solutions for the financing of support schemes, not their suspension.    ‘More than that, Romania committed, through PNIESC approved in October 2021 to produce 30.7% of the energy for end consumption of the country from renewable sources, until 2030, target which should be accompanied by new production capacities from renewable sources, to be revised in order to be in accordance with the recommendation of the European Commission for a renewable energy target of at least 38% at national level. Similarly, as the European Commision says, every wind turbine and every photovoltaic panel  have the immediate role of reducing dependence on imports of fossil fuel and produce clean energy with reduced costs’ says Mihai Balan, executive manager RPIA.   According to him, the adoption of such measures by the Romanian government will produce extremely negative effects at all levels, not only for the sector of renewables, especially in the  international business environment of today.   RWEA, PATRES and RPIA ask the government to re-analyse the proposals presented in the meeting on 24th February this year, and identify alternative measures which could produce positive effects both for the end consumer and for the producers of renewable energy.