For which wind projects will the ‘mountains be a scam’?

Of Thanks to Floudopoulos

Yesterday, the political leadership of the Ministry of Environment and Energy announced the new regulation for the “fraudulent mountains”, which puts a brake on the development of human activities, such as opening roads, any kind of technical intervention, change or alteration of the natural environment in specific areas in six mountains of the country.

The aim of the regulation is to protect the natural environment and biodiversity in areas that remain untouched over time. Specifically, the “fraudulent mountains” will include areas in the White Mountains, Sao, Smolika, Tymfi, Taygetos and Mount Hatzi.

As the political leadership of RIS pointed out, the regulation prohibits in these areas all activities, including the development of renewable energy projects. According to RIS estimates, the regulation affects projects of a few hundred MW.

Market sources state that the regulation affects projects at an early stage of development, with simple production licenses, ie projects that are quite immature. It is estimated, for example, that a project with a production license in Samothrace (Mount Saos) of 200MW is affected, as well as part of another project in Crete (White Mountains) of 30-40 MW.

For this reason, after all, the message sent informally by market sources in relation to the measure is rather reassuring, in terms of the side effects of the implementation of the regulation for fraudulent mountains.

Of course, sources of the RES market, express objections regarding the communication dimension of the measure, while they point out that if there is an expansion to other mountains of the country, there may be a problem in more and more mature investments.

In any case, it is clear that the measure as it will be implemented in the first six mountains does not cause concern or reactions in the market.