EKOenergy Newsletter 31: Solar for Tanzania, Seminar in Latvia, Jukka Toivonen

1. Climate Fund for Tanzanian solar

For each MWh of EKOenergy sold, 0,10 â‚¬ goes to the EKOenergy Climate Fund. That money is used to finance climate projects that would otherwise not have happened.

We have now decided to donate the first 10.000 â‚¬ of the Climate Fund to a solar panel project in Tanzania. The project will be implemented by the Italian NGO Oikos, in cooperation with the company SunEdison.

In 2011, Oikos got EU funding to install a small hydro turbine near the Ngarenanyuki secondary school in the Meru District, Northern Tanzania. The turbine is located on an irrigation channel. As the water flow fluctuates throughout the year, so does the electricity production: in the dry season and during irrigation time the school often remains without electricity. The money from the Climate Fund and the donation of SunEdison will allow them to add 3 kWp of solar panels to the school's electrical system.

Click here for the press release
Click here for more information about the selection process
Click here for more information about the project

2. EKOenergy seminar in Latvia

On Monday May 27 the Latvian EKOenergy members organized a workshop on green electricity sales in Latvia.

About 20 electricity consumers, authorities and suppliers discussed opportunities in a partially liberalized market, and about the role EKOenergy could play.

The representatives of the Latvian Ministry of Economy got a lot of questions about the Latvian Guarantee of Origin register. The existing database doesn't allow the registration of transfers and cancellations. The workshop will be followed up by a seminar on the subject in the fall of 2014.

The Latvian EKOenergy members also announced a campaign to convince Latvian consumers to switch to EKOenergy.

3. Solar for sale

In the statistics of issued and cancelled Guarantees of Origin, solar plays a minimal role. Less than 1% originates from solar energy. (See Annual Report 2013 of the AIB).

The reasons are obvious: the produced volumes of solar energy are still relatively small; a lot of solar electricity is produced in countries that do not allow to sell subsidized production on the voluntary market; and solar production is often locally consumed and claimed.

But times are changing. As both the production costs and the subsidies are going down, more and more stakeholders are looking for market based financing methods.

EKOenergy is interested in running a pilot project to find out if consumers show willingness to pay for (unsubsidized) solar energy, and under what conditions. One of the problems we will have to deal with is the cost of the of the Guarantee of Origin system. In many countries there are high fixed 'per installation' costs, which is a problem for decentralized production methods.

We welcome your input.

4. Seller of the week: Jukka Toivonen, Fortum

EKOenergy exists because people believe in it. Not only environmental organizations and consumers, but also sellers. One of them is Jukka Toivonen, head of electricity sales & marketing at Fortum.

"Sustainable development is an integral part of Fortum's strategy. Business and corporate social responsibility are closely connected to each other: sustainable solutions lead to important competitive advantages."

"Our commitment to EKOenergy is an element of our sustainable development policy. The EKOenergy label sets clear criteria for electricity producers and sellers. Through our sales of EKOenergy, we also contribute to the financing of river restoration projects, such as the restoration of spawning areas in Finnish rivers. And now, there is the first climate fund project in the school in Northern Tanzania. We are proud to be a part of this."

6. Residual mix? Here are the numbers!

More and more of the electricity on the European market is "explicitely tracked", in particular via Guarantees of Origin. That means that suppliers and consumers use Guarantees of Origin to prove that they sell and buy electricity from specific sources. In most cases they use Guarantees of Origin to prove that they are using green electricity.

The obvious question is: What remains for those not using these tracking mechanisms? This 'remainder' is called the residual mix. Since 2010, the residual mix figures are calculated and published by the partners of the RE-DISS project.

EKOenergy agrees with many other stakeholders on the market that these are very important numbers. Consumers, and in particular corporate consumers buying electricity whose origin is not proven by Guarantees of Origin, should add residual mix numbers to their carbon footprint.

Click here for the RE-DISS Residual Mix 2013 Report.

7. A new step towards a common European electricity market

On May 13, South-Western Europe (SWE) and North-Western Europe (NWE) day-ahead electricity markets were coupled. This means that electricity can now be exchanged from Portugal to Finland under a common day-ahead power price calculation.

The NWE project covers the markets of Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany/Austria, Great Britain, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland and Sweden. The SWE project covers a price coupling between France, Portugal and Spain.

The coupling of these 2 regions is the result of strong cooperation between Transmission System Operators and Power Exchanges from 17 European countries and a further step towards the European Internal Electricity Market.

This text is based on an ENTSO-E announcement (ENTSO-E is the European Network of Transmission System Operators), as well as on information on the APX website.