Rosatom's Novawind mulls building wind farms in Russian Far East

MOSCOW. March 6 (Interfax) - Novawind, the wind power division of Russian state corporation Rosatom, is considering building wind farms in the country's Far East, the company's deputy CEO, Viktor Svistunov said in the Federation Council.

"A number of sites for potential location of projects, including wind power, are now being considered there [in the Far East]. We believe that this could significantly expand the scale of the program to develop renewable sources of energy in the Russian Federation," Svistunov said.

The Far East is not currently part of a price zone of Russia's energy market, so the mechanism to support renewable energy - capacity supply agreements (CSA) for renewable energy sources - does not apply to this region.

The second CSA program for renewable energy, which runs to 2035, operates under capacity supply agreements that guarantee investors a return through energy market payments.

The next competitive selection of projects for the program might be pushed back from the spring to December 2024. The Energy Ministry said it needs to be postponed because it would make sense to hold the tender taking into account the inclusion of the Far East in the second price zone of the energy market, which is scheduled for July.