Renewable energy equipment almost 70% localized in Russia, Market Council says
PYATIGORSK. July 1 (Interfax) - Localization of equipment for renewable energy generation in Russia has reached almost 70%, the CEO of NP Market Council, Maxim Bystrov said on Thursday.
"We will build almost 5.5 GW by 2024 [under the state program to support renewable energy generation]. We have localized almost 70% of equipment and [created] 1.3 GW of capacity for production of equipment at Russian companies," Bystrov said at the North Caucasus Energy Forum in Mineralnye Vody.
The second stage of the program to support renewable energy on the wholesale electricity and capacity market, dubbed 2.0, was launched by the government last year "with a very successful selection" of projects, Bystrov said.
"What will we have after the successful implementation of the two programs? The share of renewable energy sources in Russia's energy balance will be 6%. This is considerable, quite a bit," Bystrov said, adding that these are only new renewable energy facilities built relatively recently.
"This is wind, solar and small hydropower plants. This is 3 trillion rubles. The first program will cost 1.8 trillion rubles, so 1.2 trillion rubles will be support for renewables 2.0. This is very serious money. For it, we will get more than 6 GW in the first program and we don't know yet how many gigawatts in the second program. Anticipated demand for domestic equipment is 10 GW," Bystrov said.
The program's goals are to provide reliable, sustainable, long-term energy supplies for economic development, meet international obligations, create new high-tech clusters for manufacturing equipment and components and assurance programs for the development of renewable energy, and to localize production, he said.
The first selection of projects for the renewables 2.0 program was won by wind generation projects with flat-rate electricity prices "essentially equal to the cost of gas generation," Bystrov said. "In other words, we reached price parity for some types of generation now, not in 2036," he said.
"No one expected such results. They called, asked, is it really true that wind generation reached such prices that it can compete with conventional [energy sources]. Yes, it's true. Moreover, this is a general global trend. In China, almost all renewable energy generation is built without state support, which speaks to the fact that it can offer a competitive price on the market," Bystrov said.