The Ministry of Energy has prepared a draft Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation on improving mechanisms for supporting renewable energy projects in the wholesale market
The project provides for a change in the procedure for applying indexation of price parameters of investment projects for the construction of solar generation facilities when calculating the price of capacity in relation to these facilities. We are talking about projects selected through a competition in 2021.
The purpose of the proposed measure is to compensate for the increase in capital investments in the construction of such facilities. It is planned to apply the adjusted indexation procedure during the investment phase (i.e. before the project is put into operation) in relation to 18 solar generation construction projects with planned delivery start dates from 2024 to 2026 and a total capacity of 775 MW.
To compensate for the effect of increasing capacity fees and eliminating the increase in the total load on consumers of the wholesale market, a parallel reduction in the basic limit values of the annual volume of support for the use of renewable energy sources will be provided, as well as a reduction in the basic limit values of the efficiency indicator. Corresponding changes will be made to the Main Directions of State Policy in the field of increasing energy efficiency of the electric power industry based on the use of renewable energy sources for the period until 2035. These measures will make it possible to maintain the planned indicators for the volume of construction of renewable energy generation facilities from 2029 to 2035 inclusive in the amount of 1.7 billion rubles.
In addition, the project provides for the principles of coordination with the system operator of the locations of generating facilities operating on the basis of the use of renewable energy sources, in order to optimize the generation structure in the Unified Power System. In particular, it is established that the system operator periodically publishes a list of zones with technological restrictions for the construction of new renewable energy facilities, which investors should focus on when submitting their applications for competitive selection.
Since it is advisable to carry out the next selection of projects for the construction of renewable energy generation facilities, taking into account the new procedure for determining their locations, expanding the territories where their construction is possible, due to the planned inclusion of the Far East regions in the pricing zones of the wholesale electricity and power market, the draft resolution provides for the postponement of the next selection of projects on the wholesale market to December 2024.