June 14 (SeeNews) - The investment fund of the Three Seas Initiative has acquired a 'significant' stake in Austrian renewable energy group Enery Development, owner of a 60 MW solar plant in Bulgaria, state-owned Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB), an investor in the fund, said.
"Utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) generation has yet to be widely deployed in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) despite the ideal conditions with high levels of irradiation and availability of suitable land. The increasingly pressing requirement to decarbonise the CEE region is expected to present substantial opportunities for renewables investment in the near term," the BDB said in a statement published on its website.
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Enery Development has a portfolio of 85 MW operating assets, of which 60 MW in Bulgaria, as well as a 2 GW pipeline for solar energy generation in Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria and Romania, the development bank added.
The Three Seas Initiative Investment Fund does not disclose information on the amount of the investments it makes, the BDB noted.
In September 2020, Enery Development acquired both the owner and the operator of the 60.4 MWp Karadzhalovo solar power plant in southern Bulgaria, for an undisclosed price. The Karadzhalovo power plant, which is the largest single-site PV plant in Bulgaria, generated 85.56 GWh of carbon-neutral energy in 2019.
Vienna-based Enery Development, founded in 2019, is an operations-led renewable power infrastructure investment company which provides affordable and reliable clean energy to its customers, according to information published on its LinkedIn profile.
At the end of last year, the BDB became a Class A shareholder in the investment fund of the Three Seas Initiative of 12 EU member states by investing some 20 million euro ($24.2 million) .
The Three Seas Initiative brings together EU member states located between the Baltic, Black, and Adriatic seas - Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Austria, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria. The political project aims to promote cooperation for the development of infrastructure in the energy, transport, and digital sectors, whereas its investment fund is a dedicated commercial fund targeting critical infrastructure investment in the region.
($ = 0.825443 euro)
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