Photon Energy Connects 7.5 MWp Solar PV Power Plant to Grid in Romania
Italy has joined the ranks of other European Banana Republicssuch as Spain, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia and the CzechRepublic by spreading the anti-solar cancer of retroactive measuresagainst operating PV assets. Wrapped in legislation designed toincrease competitiveness, the Italian government is delivering afatal blow to equity investors in PV plants with a capacity of 200+KWp, undermining any remaining confidence of financial andindustrial investors in Italy as a credible investmentdestination.
„To add insult to injury, we are invited to choose themethod of execution for our investments”, says PhotonEnergy CEO Georg Hotar. Investors are being forced tochoose between an 8% reduction in the feed-in-tariff paid by thestate agency GSE for the remainder of the support period or optingfor the FiT to be spread even more thinly over a total of 24 years(compared to the original 20 years). Effectively a reduction of17-25% is expected to apply depending on the residualtime.
With Italy’s reckless attack on investors the second-largestEuropean PV market has been destroyed. Bona-fide investors arebeing systematically targeted across the EU. “The EuropeanCommission is not only letting it happen but is instrumental inremoving Bilateral Investment Treaties between EU member countries,which have traditionally been a last line of defence forinvestors”, says Photon Energy CEO GeorgHotar.
“Under these shocking circumstances our European Solar Holdingsconcept is the only workable mechanism allowing investors to defendthemselves against retroactive regulatory and tax measures”,he adds.
Given Italy’s high dependency on energy imports, the growinginstability in many supplying countries (Russia, Libya or Iraq) andrising energy prices this kleptomaniac assault on renewable energyis impossible to rationalise. “Investors, together with aplethora of Italian and international banks, have deployed some EUR50 billion in good faith and are now the victims of a highlyirresponsible government", says GeorgHotar. Furthermore, with government debt over 120% of itsGDP Italy is strongly dependent on the bond market and itsperception by financial investors. “How the investmentcommunity will like state-sanctioned robbery will become evidentshortly in the bond market”, comments Photon Energy CEO GeorgHotar.
Starting in 2014Q3 GSE will only pay out 90% of a (most likelylow) estimated monthly production with the balancing paymenteffectuated on 30 June of the following year, putting additionalcash flow pressure on PV plant owners. GSE’s intention to charge afee for its “services” as of 1 January 2015 completes thistravesty. Combined with the steep fall in revenues over the past12-18 month (in some regions over 60%), this will push many PVplants close to or into insolvency.
Photon Energy NV owns two PV plants in Italy, with a combinedcapacity of 1.25 MWp, which have been fully equity-financed.“The announced measures will not leave our PV plants vulnerableto default but will materially decrease our returns and theirvalue. We will only be able to quantify our losses once the finalversion of the law will have been approved”, said GeorgHotar.
Jan Krcmar
T +420 773 032 182
E jan.krcmar@photonenergy.com
Photon Energy NV is a global solar power solutions and servicescompany covering the entire lifecycle of solar power systems. Sinceits foundation in 2008 Photon Energy has built and commissioned 50MWp of solar power plants across two continents and supplied thetechnology for many more projects. Photon Energy’s O&M divisionhas more than 100 MWp under contract and is the leading provider ofmaintenance services for Satcon inverters. www.photonenergy.com