Austria Adopts New Feed-in Tariffs
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The Austrian Economics Ministry has announced new feed-in tariffs for solar and wind farms on its website (open it in Chrome or use Google Translate to translate to English).
The feed-in tariffs for wind power were reduced by 0.005 cents per kWh of the electricity generation cost, from 9.5 cents to 9.45 cents per kWh in the second half of 2012. The ministry says that this will provide incentives for the construction of wind farms in “efficient areas.”
The Austrian government has set aside €11.5 million for the construction of new wind farms annually.
For photovoltaic solar panels (these are just ordinary electricity-generating solar panels), no support is provided for systems that generate more than 500 kW. This is to prevent large, expensive power plant projects from consuming most of the budget.
Ground-mounted solar panel arrays smaller than 500 kW will be eligible for 16.59 cents per kilowatt-hour in 2013, 10 percent less than the current 18.43 cents. Building-integrated solar panel array projects will receive not only a feed-in tariff, but also an upfront investment bonus. The ministry says that this will encourage more direct consumption of solar power, rather than transmitting it all to the electricity grid.
Building-integrated systems now receive a 19.7 cents per kWh tariff on top of a 30% payment of the total system cost (which is limited to €200 per kW). The ministry says this is equivalent to a feed-in tariff of almost 22 cents.
In 2013, the feed-in tariffs will drop to 18.12 cents. Future feed-in tariffs will be decreased at a rate of 8% per year.
Small hydroelectric power plant projects have the option to utilize a feed-in tariff of 10.6 cents per kWh for the first 500 MWh of power it generates, or a 30% up front bonus.
Their tariffs will be more than halved if their capacity is in excess of 2 MW and they generate over 7.5 MWh. These rates are to drop by 0.5% in 2013.
Biomass is only eligible for feed-in tariffs if used in cogeneration units. Their tariffs range from 11 to 18 cents per kWh for small units.
Source: Renewables International
Image Credit: Engelbert Hosner/pixelio.de
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