A second RES auction for the year concerning new projects begins today, offering capacities to investors for three project categories: small-scale photovoltaic installations of up to one MW, larger-scale PV installations measuring between one and 20 MW, and wind energy installations of between 3 and 50 MW.

The first of these three categories has drawn the biggest number of participants, representing a total of 192 projects, compared to 27 in the second category and 14 in the third.

Six percent of first-category applicants were disqualified over their failure to provide all required documents in applications. This serves as a reminder of the difficulties faced by many small-scale PV investors in dealing with the auction’s complex procedures.

Factors expected to help shape bidding prices include a demand-response mechanism surcharge of 3.6 percent imposed on PV investments; considerably lower solar panel prices, now constituting no more than 30 percent of total installation costs; a rumored government plan entailing the introduction of sustainable RES tariff prices to be offered beyond auction procedures for small PV units with capacities up to 500 kW; as well as an energy ministry plan, recently forwarded for public consultation, setting high RES penetration targets for 2030, including a 56 percent share of total electricity consumption by the sector.

An older National Technical University of Athens study, dated back to 2013, had forecast RES penetration at approximately 37 percent of overall electricity consumption by 2025, as well as drops to 20 percent without storage infrastructure and 14 percent without the development of a centralized storage system.