The chief executive of E.ON Romania, the local unit of German utility
E.ON AG (EOAN.XE), Wednesday said the company will abandon its green
energy projects unless the government reconsiders its plan to reduce
subsidies, news agency Mediafax reports.
"It all depends on whether the law on supporting renewable
energy is changed. If the law is modified, then we give up [our
projects]," Frank Hajdinjak told a news conference.
E.ON Romania is currently developing wind farm projects with a
combined capacity of 120 megawatts in the eastern region of Moldavia.
Romanian producers of renewable energy benefit from government
support via a green certificates scheme, which allows them to recover
part of the production costs. Each renewable energy producer is granted a
number of green certificates for power fed into the electricity grid.
The subsidies, which are eventually passed onto consumers'
electricity bills, are not available for producers of conventional
energy.
The government recently announced that it would temporarily
reduce the number of green certificates in the scheme to prevent a sharp
rise in electricity prices. The measure will be applied between July
2013 and December 2016.