Turkey touts ambitious renewable energy plans as it awards 1 GW of wind capacity
Turkey aims to increase the share of the domestic and renewable energy sources in the country’s electricity production to two-thirds by 2023, said Turkey’s Energy and Natural Resources Minister Fatih Donmez said at a recently held G20 ministerial meeting in Japan. “Last month another wind auction for 1 gigawatt capacity was also successfully completed,” Donmez […]
BiH, Kosovo*, Serbia pay EUR 444 million in coal subsidies, EUR 147 million for renewables – report
The three most coal-intensive Energy Community (EnC) Contracting Parties – Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, and Serbia – paid a total of EUR 444 million in direct subsidies to coal, while their incentives for production from renewables reached EUR 147 million during the period 2015-2017. The total sum of direct subsidies in all Contracting Parties, including […]
Nearly 200 families hit by pollution from Veliki Crljeni open-pit coal mine
Residents of Veliki Crljeni, a suburban settlement only 50 kilometers from the center of Belgrade, again wrote to the Serbian President and the Prime Minister over the past week, demanding that institutions and the state, the owner of power utility Elektroprivreda Srbije (EPS), resolve the pollution problem that has been plaguing them for more than […]
European Commission: Kosovo* continues to rely on lignite, some progress seen on renewables
Kosovo* has some level of preparation in the field of energy, but continues to rely on highly polluting lignite, according to the European Commission’s latest annual report, part of its annual assessment of the implementation of reforms in the Western Balkan partners. Kosovo* made some progress in the area of energy, including the adoption of […]
IEEFA: GE lost billions in market capitalization by misjudging energy transition
According to a report by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), General Electric (GE) lost USD 193 billion or 74% of its market capitalization over 2016-2018. “This value destruction was driven in large measure by the collapse of the new thermal power construction market globally – a collapse which caught GE entirely […]
Montenegro registers 10 days of coal-free electricity generation
Montenegro produced enough electricity to cover domestic consumption from renewable energy sources only from May 24 to June 2, 2019, for the first time ever going coal-free for 10 days, the Government of Montenegro said in a press release. During the period, coal-fired power plant Pljevlja was not operating, yet Montenegro produced around 82 million […]
Greens land historic result in European elections in clear call for climate action
The Greens claimed their best ever result in the European Parliament (EP) elections held over the weekend, in what is seen as voters’ call for climate action. The Greens/EFA group, projected to have around 20 seats more than so far, is set to be the fourth-largest force in the EP, which could put it in […]
Montenegro scraps feed-in tariff surcharge
The Montenegrin government has decided to abolish the surcharge paid by consumers through electricity bills to fund the feed-in tariff scheme for privileged power producers. The funds collected through the surcharge will instead be secured through coal excise duty. Answering MPs questions in the parliament, Prime Minister Duško Marković said the abolition of the surcharge […]