The Electric Power Company of Serbia (EPS) has actively joined the trend of decarbonization and green transition, in which it plans to invest around eight billion euros in the period from 2023 to 2035, Politika announced in an overview of the investment plans of the largest domestic company in the electricity sector.
As part of the “Green Path of the EPS”, more than 50 percent of total investments, i.e. as much as 4.2 billion euros, are planned for increasing the share of renewable energy sources (RES) in electricity production through the modernization and construction of hydropower plants, wind farms and solar power plants, it is stated in the publication “Green Plan EPS”, which the company published in October last year.
EPS plans to invest about 450 million euros in the revitalization and modernization of existing hydroelectric plants, while the planned funds for the construction of new hydroelectric plants are about 1.8 billion.
The largest part of the funds in the implementation of the “Green Road” is intended for the construction of new production capacities that will use solar and wind energy, about 1.95 billion euros.
“With the realization of the plans from the ‘Green Road’, the participation of RES in the total installed capacities of EPS would increase from about 37 percent to more than 60 percent by 2035.”
With the planned investment projects, the annual production of electricity from renewable energy sources within the EPS would be increased from the current approximately 10,000 gigawatt-hours to approximately 16,500 in 2035.
This would increase 30 percent of the energy produced from RES to almost half of the total production of the EPS 2– said Miroslav Tomašević, acting director of this public company, as reported by Politika.
The largest jump in the share of RES is planned for the next seven to eight years, and the continuous development and implementation of projects will continue even after that.
When it comes to the newly built RES capacities, it is expected that the Kostolac wind farm will be “on the grid” next year, and the “Petka” solar power plant of around 10 megawatts should be completed in the same period. It is also planned to install solar panels on the roofs of the “Nikola Tesla” thermal power plant, as well as on the ash pits “Kolubara A” and “Morava”.
“The key project that will enable integration into the network of planned variable renewable energy sources (wind and solar) is the reversible hydroelectric power plant (HE) Bistrica. The necessary energy reserve for balancing variable renewable sources will be provided by the implementation of this HPP with a planned capacity of 628 megawatts,” reminds Politika.
EPS announced in the “Green Plan” the revitalization of the existing hydroelectric power plants, and the most significant projects include works on the modernization of HPPs “Bistrica”, “Potpeć”, “Đerdap 2” and “Vlasinsk hydroelectric power plants”.
“After the revitalization, the installed power in these hydroelectric power plants is expected to increase by more than 50 megawatts,” the Belgrade daily notes, and in the text draws attention to investments in new hydroelectric power plants on the Ibar and Velika Morava rivers, as well as the installation of the fourth unit at the HPP ”Potpeć” with a power of 12.7 megawatts.
