CONTAMINATED lands, blighted by fallout from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, could be cleaned up in a clever way: by growing biofuels. Belarus, the country affected by much of the fallout, is planning to use the crops to suck up the radioactive strontium and caesium and make the soil fit to grow food again within decades rather than hundreds of years.

The German Siemens giant, one of the world’s main wind turbine manufacturers, intends to enter onto the Romanian market, where business has a potential of several tens of billions of euro. Siemens will also participate in all auctions to be organized by investors in wind energy, said company officials, quoted by Business Standard.

 

Sofia. On Friday Bulgarian Minister of Economy and Energy Petar Dimitrov is to open a roundtable discussion titled Development of Wind Energy Parks in Bulgaria – Together with Environment Preservation.
The forum takes place in the seaside town of Kavarna. The organizers are the European Parliament, municipality of Kavarna and Association of Producers of Ecological Energy in Bulgaria.

The latest plan lays the groundwork for ration of use of existing energy resources and the sustainable and efficient supply of power in the future. The Ukraine and the EBRD will work together to review the country’s energy tariffs and legislation, introduce a legal framework to support renewable energy and improve energy efficiency of residential and public buildings.

The EBRD will also look at investing in projects focusing on industrial energy efficiency, clean power and renewable energy, supply and infrastructure.

 

The number of wind power generators in Northeastern Bulgaria is expected to be over 600 with a capacity of 1500 MW, Economy and Energy Minister Petar Dimitrov stated at a round table recently.

Prime Minister Robert Fico presented to Chinese President Hu Jintao on Friday several opportunities for the Asian country to invest in Slovakia. They welcomed the signing of an agreement on Friday that will create a basis for joint Slovak-Chinese entrepreneurial activities aimed at use of solar energy.

Kazakhstan Electricity Grid Operating Co. (KEGOC) proposes turnkey construction of transmission lines, including a 220-kilovolt Moinak-Sary-Ozek overhead line, a 220-kV Moinak-Shelek line, and a 220-kV line at Sary-Ozek substation.

More than 30 companies from Austria and over 80 firms from Slovakia have joined the Days initiative, which was held in the eastern Slovak town of Presov recently.

 

We are considering building a Greenfield wind energy park with a power between 20 and 50MW, for which we are analyzing four possible locations. We have negotiated in the past, but the price didn’t meet our requirements. Within two years, we will start the construction works”, said Petre Stroe EGL Managing Director.

Reconstruction work began June 2, 2009, at Bajina Basta in Perucac.

Russia's Power Machines is to supply a turbine and 201-MW generator to the Djerdap 1 project and proceed with partial renovation of the remaining five units to increase unit capacity to 201 MW from 174 MW

TKB General Manager Abdullah Çelik said they have  recently secured some $180 million in loans solely for renewable energy investment in Turkey, $150 million of which came from the World Bank while the remaining $30 million was supplied by the Clean Technology Fund (CTF).

PannTerm will begin drilling geothermal wells near Kiskunhalas after it obtains the necessary land rights and permits.

 

A total of 70 projects, including renewable energy projects,  will receive  financing from the Norwegian Cooperation Programme and from the European Economic Area (EEA) Financial Mechanism, Norway's  Ambassador in Sofia Tove Skarstein told journalists.

Elana Holding, the Bulgarian investor and project developer, is going ahead with a 48MW wind farm in the southern Ivaylovgrad Region.

IEEE PowerTech 2009 in Bucharest, Romania June 28 - July 2, 2009, scientists and engineers throughout Europe will gather to discuss topics such as artificial intelligence techniques in power systems, developing the concept of smart grids and restructuring of the electricity industry and transnational networks.

Since the majority of Kyrgyz mini-hydropower plants require reconstruction rather than construction from the ground up, their payback period would not exceed 5-10 years. Many mini-hydropower plants, partially constructed and abandoned after the commissioning of large scale hydropower plants, have preserved dams and other capital facilities,  which would have been costly to build. Although mini-hydropower plants cannot become a meaningful alternative to large power stations, they can be regarded as a good local investment solution.

Romanian minister of Economy Adriean Videanu announced at the EU-Russia economic Forum that there will be a second hydra-electric power station on the Danube river.

Italian energy provider Petrolvilla is interested in building a hydro-power plant at Maritsa river in southern Bulgaria, the company's president said.

The European Wind Energy Association (EWEA), the Romania Wind Energy Association (RWEA) and the Centre for the Promotion of Clean and Efficient Energy in Romania (ENERO) are pleased to invite you to a workshop exploring the untapped wind power potential in Romania and issues related to the further development of this power-generating technology in the country.

The Supervisory Council of the Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies, RUSNANO, has approved the corporation’s participation in a project to produce solar modules using thin-film technology. 
RUSNANO CEO Anatoly Chubais commented on the project: “We are talking about creating the largest base in Russia for the production of solar batteries. This is the most significant investment in alternative energy on the territory of the Russian Federation.” 
A new company is to be established under the project at Khimprom’s industrial park in the city of Novocheboksarsk in the Chuvash Republic. The company will realize the entire cycle of production for solar modules. Its planned capacity is to be one million solar modules per year, the equivalent of 120 MW per year. 
The core participants in the project are RUSNANO and RENOVA Group. 

The port of Klaipeda is ready to handle large pieces of equipment like the electrical unit to be used in a Irish wind farm.

Austrian companies are interested in the construction of a cascade of hydropower stations in Belarus, Leonid Shenets, deputy chairman of the State Standardization Committee of Belarus – director of the energy efficiency department, told mass media in a plenary session within the Energy Days of Austria in Belarus on May 13.

March 16-18, 2010