Italy’s energy provider Petrolvilla plans to build a 100-million-euro hydropower cascade in Bulgaria and is also considering the construction of a 150-million-euro solar park, a company official said. It is also in talks with Italian utility Enel for joint participation in the planned hydro project along the Maritsa River in southern Bulgaria, Petrolvilla’s chief executive for Bulgaria, Plamen Dilkov, told Reuters.
“They [Enel] have made us a financial offer... which foresees their participation,” Dilkov said in an interview late on Wednesday but gave no other details. Enel holds a 73 percent stake in Bulgaria’s thermal power plant Maritsa East Three. “Bulgaria is a good place for [renewable energy] projects, because no such investments have been realized so far. This is a vacant market,” Dilkov said.
Hydropower now accounts for 10-12 percent of the European Union member country’s electricity and most of the existing plants were built during the communist era before 1989. Bulgaria wants to increase the share of renewable energy to 16 percent by 2020 as part of the EU’s efforts to combat climate change. Sofia provides incentives such as preferential prices for power produced from wind, solar and hydro.
(KATHIMERINI, 10/23/2009)