Overview of legislation

By means of the legislation number 220/2008 for the promotion of renewable sources of energy, Romania recognizes the provision in directive n. 2009/28/CE of Parliament and of the Council of Europe on promoting the use of renewable energy.

With the emergency ordinance that modified the legislation n. 220/2008 concerning the promotion of systems producing energy from renewable sources, the Romanian government estimates that in the next few years investment in the sector of renewable energy will be equal to 4 – 5 billion euro.

Reading the reform carefully it becomes clear that the solar sector will benefit greatly from this.

Irradiation map

Romania has a great potential for the production of solar energy , and this type of technology may play an important part in the energy mix that Romania is aiming for over the next few years.

The radiation levels are similar to those that are to be found in countries that already have the tradition in the development of solar power: Spain, Italy, Greece etc... according to the Common European research center, Romania receives an average of 1.530 MWh/m2 of sunshine per year putting it in sixth place when comparing it with the all the 27 EU members.

This may be translated as an average of about 1150 kWh of electric energy for each kWp in the installation.

Incentive schemes

What Romania offers, as opposed to the other European states, apart from similar atmospheric conditions, is a more attractive support system, as well as a more stable economy.

The incentive scheme for the production of solar energy adopted by the Romanian state is based on a system of Green Certificates (GC).

Those who produce green electricity are assigned a GC number which varies according to the technology employed.

The Green Certificates are issued by the operators of the transmission system SC Transelectra SA on a monthly basis and are traded on the GC (Global Commodity )markets, according to the terms and conditions established by the SC "Operatorul Pieţei Electrica de Energie – OPCOM" SA.

The producers of renewable solar energy can get 6 Green Certificates for each MWh produced.

By means of the ANRE Ordinance N° 4/22.02.2012 the following transaction rates are envisaged for GC on the GC market:

Subjects who have to buy the Green certificates

Those who are obliged to obtain Green Certificates floated on the market by renewable energy producers are:

The distributors and the producers of electrical energy are obliged to obtain a number of Green Certificates each year equal to the product between the value of the obligatory annual quota of CV envisaged for the respective year (for example: 0,03746 GC/MWh/2011 conforming to ANRE Ordinance n. 5/2012) and the quantity of electrical energy expressed in MWh supplied each year to the consumer.

The suppliers that are not able to reach the obligatory annual quota will pay a penalty equal to the total value of the Green Certificates not acquired (for the year 2012 the penalty was set at a nominal 114,777 €/CV not acquired - about double the maximum market value).