The Investment Council (IC) hold a plenary meeting to discuss the SMEs’ challenges to transition to alternative energy sources chaired by the Minister of Finance and Economy, Mrs. Delina Ibrahimaj, with the special participation of the EBRD’s Managing Director for Policy Strategy and Delivery, Mr Christoph Denk. In this Meeting, FIAA was represented by Dr Constantin von Alvensleben, FIAA/Voltalia, which currently is the biggest Solar project with construction of the Karavasta solar plant with 140 MW.
Mr. Alvensleben stressed that despite MIE has strongly promoted the development towards renewable energies, there are still numerous issues for renewable energy developers:
- Unclear land ownership titles.
- Shortening the approval process of construction permits by the National Council of the Territory, which is currently too long and bureaucratic.
- The selling of energy can be facilitated if there are international interconnection lines with increased capacities
- Renewable energies are intermittent by nature because if the sun is not shining or the wind is not blowing, no energy is produced. Therefore, the storage of energy is very important, but currently, there is a lack of regulatory framework on battery-based power storage.
- Agricultural land is definitely very important for agriculture, but in some non-fertile areas for agriculture, it would be in the interest of energy-producing investors to facilitate the transfer of the destination of these lands from agricultural to land for energy production.
- A good fiscal climate is also very important.
For more information please visit: https://www.investment.com.al/2023/02/01/investment-council-puts-forward-recommendations-for-facilitating-the-smes-transitioning-to-alternative-energy-sources/