Portugal to waive environmental impact researches for solar plants under 50MW

• Portugal will certainly stop calling for environmental effect evaluations for new solar projects with a capacity of under 50MW as part of federal government efforts to accelerate PV deployment.

That is according to Portugal's secretary of state for power, João Galamba, who claimed he just recently received a letter from solar programmers having recommendations on measures to sustain new capacity additions in the context of Russia's war in Ukraine.

After Portugal passed a brand-new decree regulation in January that will accelerate renewables allowing, Galamba claimed there will certainly be extra measures to accelerate it even additionally.

" I'm not claiming that we followed all the recommendations, yet we covered all the issues increased by the programmers that wrote me asking for a lengthy listing of measures," Galamba stated at today's Large Scale Solar occasion in Lisbon, held by PV Tech publisher Solar Media.

Environmental effect assessments for solar projects under 20MW recommended for "sensitive locations" in Portugal will certainly also no longer be called for, according to Galamba.

" Our objective is to decarbonise as quickly as we can. For Portugal, it refers nationwide security to decarbonise fast," he stated.

Measures consisted of in the new mandate law have actually rated by Portuguese solar players, with Miguel Lobo, nation head Portugal at developer Lightsource bp, describing it as "progressive, ingenious and also forward-looking".

With a lot of projects under advancement in the nation, Lobo said this places a great deal of pressure on federal government entities along with financiers, developers and environmental experts. "It's very tough to discover a skilled environmental professional that executes the environmental research according to the environmental agency requirements. To ensure that's quite challenging."

Regardless of the brand-new legislation, João Amaral, primary innovation police officer as well as Portugal nation manager at programmer Voltalia, said the obstacles he expects to continue will be around the connection with towns in addition to issues around neighborhood approval of PV plants.

While it is different from region to area, it depends on project designers and independent power producers to explain exactly how the modern technology works and what the lasting positive effects are, he stated, including: "However it's definitely quite an obstacle that we see."

According to numbers from Portuguese renewable energy association APREN, PV plants completing 311MW of capacity were added in 2021, up on the 153MW of solar added in 2020.

While the nation is aiming to reach at least 9GW of PV deployed by 2030, APREN CEO Pedro Amaral Jorge stated throughout the panel discussion that the nation should aim greater considered that some capacity will be made use of for hydrogen manufacturing.

He included: "I believe most of us recognize that power freedom as well as security of supply actually requires to relocate faster."