MPs accepted the climate neutrality card but postponed free electricity prices

The Parliamentary Energy and Environment Committees decided on Wednesday to support the climate neutrality roadmap updated by the Council of Ministers as early as January 2024. This happened on the proposal of GERB submitted two days ago, and earlier in the day the PP-DB accused the deputies of not accepting this document and three more measures that are necessary to unlock the second payment of over 700 million .euro from the grants from the EC under the Recovery and Sustainability Plan.

At the same time, however, the energy commission approved on second reading the postponement of the release of wholesale electricity prices by one year, which is also part of the commitments pi under the recovery plan. However, the start date of the liberalization of electricity prices for households is not changed and it remains 1 January 2026. This is fixed both in the energy law and in the draft climate neutrality roadmap, the final adoption of which, however, is still pending.

This document presents by periods the target measures and policies, as well as key stages of the development of the electricity sector, taking into account the development of other key sectors of the economy.

By 2026, they must introduce a new 3,500 MW of renewable energy sources, as well as 1,000 MW of electricity storage facilities. By 2030, renewable energy capacities should reach 7,500 MW, and among them there should be wind plants in sea waters, and batteries for electricity should increase to 1,600 MW.

For coal-fired power plants, a deadline of December 31, 2038 has been set for their withdrawal, and by 2035 a capacity of 1 gigawatt of power plants using lignite coal as a strategic reserve to provide critical needs to ensure the national electricity balance can be maintained, foresees also the road map for climate neutrality. However, the details of how this will be done are not clear.

It is noted that the coal plants must operate on a market basis, and at the same time, in order to guarantee the operation of the state thermal power plant “Maritsa Iztok 2”, the maintenance of the regulated electricity prices is undertaken until next July. The state power plant will receive a guaranteed quota for selling its expensive electricity to households, which is actually a burden on domestic consumers. However, the MPs are delaying the free electricity prices with the argument that there will be no increase in people’s bills

By 2035, RES capacities are expected to exceed 10,000 megawatts, and large-scale offshore wind farms – 1,500 megawatts.

A “minor” detail is that the bill regulating the construction of marine renewable energy sources was blocked after the tourist and restaurant business jumped against the installation of fins and the leader of GERB, Boyko Borisov, stopped the examination of the introduced corrections in the texts between the first and second reading. This is how the paradox arises that in the road map there is a fixed obligation for offshore RES, but there are no rules for their construction and there is resistance against them.

During the debate on the road map, Iskra Mihailova from “Vazrazhdane” expressed concerns that the update was related to the upcoming elections and refused the support of her party.

Dragomir Stoynev from “BSP for Bulgaria” did not agree with the urgency of adopting the map, which, according to him, predicted too much offshore wind. He also stated that the Socialists would not support the document because they were in favor of a comprehensive review of the European Union’s Green Deal.

In the end, the energy committee adopted the draft updated climate neutrality roadmap by 17 votes to 6, and the eco committee by 12 votes to 5.