IPTO, the power grid operator, is preparing to offer renewable energy source (RES) companies with licenses for prospective wind-energy parks on the island Evia, slightly northeast of the wider Athens area, additional time to submit applications for connections to the national grid as well as favorable payment terms for their respective shares of the cost entailed in the development of a submarine cable connection linking the island’s Polypotamos area with Nea Makri, on the mainland, at the opposite end.

The RES companies will be requested to cover their shares of the project’s cost through installments in 2016. Test runs of the new submarine connection began last summer. Investors were meant to have already paid their shares of the project’s cost and submitted applications for connections to the grid within a three-month period. But the wider impact of the country’s recession has held back plans.

Energypress has been informed that the Evia-linked offers for RES license holders were decided on at a meeting last week that was organized by RAE, the Regulatory Authority for Energy, and involved the participation of IPTO, HEDNO, the Hellenic Electricity Distribution Network Operator, as well as representatives of companies intending to develop wind-energy facilities on the island.

The Polypotamos-Nea Makri submarine cable connection project was included by IPTO in its investment plan as a result of existing licenses for development of high-capacity wind-energy facilities in south Evia as well as on the interconnected islands of Andros and Tinos from as far back as 2000. Development of the licensed wind-energy parks has been held back by the mainland grid’s inability to absorb the potential electricity production to be generated on these islands.