Agro Perspectiva

Ukraine should reach 12% share of renewable energy sources till 2020, says energy efficiency agency

15.06.2012 10:14 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) — Ukraine should reach a 12% share of renewable energy sources within total energy balance of the country until 2020. The state has undertaken relevant obligations while joining the Energy Community. Therefore, the Updated Energy Strategy of Ukraine till 2030 prepared drafted by the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry requires significant adjustment. «Ukraine should fulfill its obligations within the Energy Community, in particular, reaching a 12% share of renewable energy sources within the energy balance of the country until 2020,» press office of the State Agency on Energy Efficiency and Energy Saving of Ukraine quotes its chairman, Mykola Pashkevych, UKRINFORM reports. He stressed that the Agency has repeatedly highlighted this issue as a matter of principle. The Agency considers that it is necessary to increase the capacity rates of installed renewable power plants into the country’s energy strategy up to 6.4 GW in 2015, 9 GW — in 2020, 13 GW — in 2025 and 17 GW — in 2030. Electricity generation from renewable energy sources should reach 13 TW/hours in 2015, 18 TW/hours — in 2020, 26 TW/hours — in 2025 and 34 TW/hours in 2030. «These figures are absolutely real, they are based on scientific studies, expert conclusions, statistics on commissioned objects and trends of their installation,» Mykola Pashkevych said. The State Agency on Energy Efficiency and Energy Saving also mentioned that the updated energy strategy drafted by the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry is not in line with the state program for energy saving and renewable energy development, approved by the government in 2010. In particular, this program provides for the increase in the share of renewable electricity generation up to 10% of total energy output in 2015, whereas the draft updated energy strategy assumes the increase only up to 4.6% not until 2030. The current situation has resulted from uncoordinated action of the industry authorities, the Agency said. The Agency also reported that in the nearest future it intends to send once again to the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry its proposals and comments on the draft updated energy strategy. These proposals have been recently supported by the public council within the Agency. It has been reported that the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry has recently unveiled the draft Updated Energy Strategy of Ukraine till 2030 for the public discussion. The document contains extremely modest targets for the development of the renewable energy industry. For example, by 2020 the share of renewable energy sources within total energy generation is to increase up to 1.7%, and by 2030 — only up to 4.6%. According to the document, electricity generation from renewable energy sources is expected to reach 4 TW/h till 2020 in Ukraine out of the total generation at the level of 236 TW/h, and 13 TW/h out of the total generation at the level of 282 TW/h in 2030. An optimistic scenario described in the project with the supposed more active development of economy and therefore the increase of electric power generation implies the reduction of the share of electricity generation from renewable energy sources according to the baseline scenario of up to 1.6% in 2020 and 4.5% — in 2030. Therefore, an additional demand for electricity should be covered by more intensive development of nuclear power and thermal power stations operating on coal, gas and other fossil fuels, believes the Ministry. Ukraine became a member of the Energy Community in February 2011. While joining the Energy Community, the state has undertaken obligations to implement a number of European energy directives. The current version of the Energy Strategy of Ukraine till 2030 was developed in 2005 and approved by Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine in 2006.