Yesterday the government pushed through its revision to the Act on Support for Renewable Energies, which is supposed to soften the effect of compulsory purchases of alternative energy on end prices for consumers.
One of the provisions in the revision, submitted by SaS MP Ludovit Jurcik, toughened the conditions for solar energy production, as it now limits support to solar panels with a minimum capacity of 100 kilowatts. As part of its commitment to the EU, electricity distributors have to purchase a certain volume of renewable energies and combined cycle operations.
The end result of this is that the utility regulator URSO should now be able to set a lower wholesale price for alternative energy than the 10% that the law allows at present. The growing number of photovoltaic companies in Slovakia will not be too pleased, but as economy minister Juraj Miskov points out, the idea is to prevent speculative alternative energy producers from taking advantage of the weak regulation in place to date.