Green Energy Said to Drive Up Bulgarian Electricity Bills

Electricity bills in Bulgaria will go up by 10% as of July 1, 2012, because of the green energy charges paid by consumers, according to Angel Semerdzhiev, head of the State Commission for Energy and Water Regulation (DKEVR).

Even though Semerdzhiev has justified the hike with the green energy cost, critics have pointed out that there has been a drop in the prices the state pays for renewable energy.

According to renewable energy associations, the electricity price hike will result from increasing the transit fees for conventional energy

"I can give you a simple example – if a family pays BGN 100 per month for electricity, it used to pay BGN 2 for green energy, and will be paying BGN 3 from now on," explained Velizar Kiryakov, head of APEE.

APEE has criticized the state regulator for intending to up the price of energy produced from wood because this is said to lead to a boom of illegal logging.

At present, Bulgarian water-power plants are the largest producers of green energy – reaching a total capacity of 2500 MW in 2011, followed by wind parks with a capacity of 900 MW; photovoltaic parks reached 100 MW last year, while Bulgarian biomass plants reached only BGN 16 MW

All renewable energy facilities' combined capacity produce about 11% of Bulgaria's total energy. According to Bulgaria's commitment in the EU, its green energy is supposed to be 16% of its total production in 2020.