The Seimas tends to ease the conditions for the participants of the offshore wind tender | Business

On Thursday, following the discussion, the Seimas approved the proposals of the members of the Economic Committee, conservative Kazios Starkevičius and social democrat Gintautas Paluckas, to allow one participant to participate in the repeated auction, instead of two, as required now, and the price of electricity sales might be recalculated by changing the scope of state incentives every year.

69 members of the Seimas voted for the consideration of such amendments to the Renewable Energy Energy Law, six were once morest, and 24 abstained. The Seimas decided to consider the amendments as a matter of urgency – they will vote on them for the last time next week.

Minister of Energy Dainius Kreivys assured that the new tender will be competitive.

“Players from all over the world are invited to participate. We cannot say that we will choose only one,” he said before the vote.

According to K. Starkevičius, Lithuania needs to hurry, because the construction of more than one wind park in the Baltic and North Seas has been started and is planned to be started.

“We are now competing for investors to invest with us with this project. It is necessary to hurry to that train or ship passing by, because we may not actually build that second park, which is very necessary for the energy independence of the country. And now the sayings that this is it – let’s wait, let’s see… Those conditions of the tender will ensure that whoever wants to invest can participate in that tender under the most optimal conditions and we will have a result”, said K. Starkevičius.

“In order to attract investors, we are changing the conditions. (…) Time is not on our side,” he added.

Robert Šarknickas, a member of the peasant faction, said that in municipalities, if only one participant participates, the competition is canceled altogether.

At that time, Artūras Skardžius was indignant that the amendments would allow 120 hectares of the Baltic Sea territory to be granted “with an easy hand” without a tender for 40 years.

“The last competition was a fiasco because there was only one participant. This is a procedure invented by the special law regarding the second wind park in the Baltic Sea, that it will be called a tender if there is one participant. Will VERT negotiate with one participant?” asked A. Skardžius.

D. Kreivys previously did not rule out that the second wind farm, like the first, might be built by the state-controlled “Ignitis grupė”, and the tender would take place even if only one participant had registered. According to him, a new tender for the second offshore wind park might be announced at the end of this year and be completed by 2025.

The second tender did not take place until mid-April following receiving only one application, submitted by Ignitis renewables, a subsidiary of Ignitis Group.

Lithuania is preparing to build two wind parks in the Baltic Sea by 2030, each with a capacity of 700 MW. Both parks would provide approximately half of Lithuania’s current electricity needs.