ORLEN Group Expands Renewable Energy Holdings with Greenvolt Acquisition, Aiming for 9 GW Capacity by 2030

ORLEN Group Expands Renewable Energy Holdings with Greenvolt Acquisition, Aiming for 9 GW Capacity by 2030

(IN BRIEF) The ORLEN Group, a Polish energy company, is strengthening its renewable energy segment by acquiring two projects from Greenvolt. The projects, located in the Poznań Province, consist of a 22 MW photovoltaic farm and a 26 MW wind farm combined with a 10 MW photovoltaic installation. These projects will add 59 MW to the ORLEN Group’s existing renewable energy capacity of about 700 MW. The company plans to increase its green assets’ capacity over tenfold by 2030, investing more than PLN 50 billion in green projects. The acquisition is part of the company’s transformation towards a sustainable and zero-emission energy system.

(PRESS RELEASE) PŁOCK, 26-Jul-2023 — /EuropaWire/ — ORLEN Group plans further RES investments in the Poznań Province. Energa Wytwarzanie of the ORLEN Group has signed a preliminary agreement with Greenvolt to purchase a wind farm and four photovoltaic installations. The projects under development have a total capacity of 59 MW and, once the sale is finalised, will join the renewable energy sources of about 700 MW already operating in the ORLEN Group.

“We will increase the capacity of our green assets more than 10 times by 2030, providing clean, zero-emission energy necessary to ensure the competitiveness of the Polish economy. To achieve this goal we are going to spend more than PLN 50 billion – both on our own projects and on the acquisition of the most prospective projects on the market. The assets we are buying from the Greenvolt Group are yet another step in the transformation of our energy system,” says Daniel Obajtek, CEO and President of the ORLEN Management Board.

The transaction with Greenvolt concerns two RES projects underway in the Poznań Province. The first is the Opalenica project, comprising three photovoltaic farms with a total capacity of 22 MW. The second is the Sompolno hybrid project, a combination of 26 MW wind turbines and a 10 MW photovoltaic installation. This solution enables making the most of existing connection conditions by linking the new asset to a service line which is already in place and operational. Cable pooling works exceptionally well for connecting wind and photovoltaic farms, as they seldom operate at full capacity simultaneously.

The Opalenica project is expected to achieve full operational readiness by December 2023, and Sompolno – by June 2024. The assets being acquired can produce 111 GWh of energy annually, equivalent to the energy consumption of over 55,000 households. Greenvolt Power of the Greenvolt Group is responsible for building both projects and bringing them to the operational phase.

Energa Wytwarzanie has many years of experience in the construction and management of renewable sources. In the first quarter of this year, Energa Group’s renewable energy installations generated about 0.5 TWh of green energy, and 1.3 TWh for the whole of 2022. After the acquisition of the Opalenica and Sompolno portfolios, Energa Group’s total installed RES capacity will increase by 10% from the current one, exceeding 600 MW.

Energa Wytwarzanie has recently completed the construction of two solar farms – PV Wielbark in the Olsztyn Province, with a total capacity of about 62 MW, and PV Gryf in the Poznań Province, with a capacity of about 25 MW. In addition, a project to build five small-scale solar installations of up to 1 MW each is being finalised. Energa also plans to build PV Mitra (65 MW) and PV Żuki (2.4 MW) photovoltaic farms. Energa Green Development, a company dedicated to onshore renewable development within the ORLEN Group, currently holds in its portfolio approximately 500 MW of renewable energy projects at various stages of development. Offshore wind power also represents a major focus for expanding ORLEN Group’s renewable energy capacity. In late May this year, ORLEN Group companies secured five more sites in the Baltic Sea for offshore wind farms, where assets with a total capacity of about 5.2 GW may be built. In aggregate, the ORLEN Group already holds six offshore wind farm sites with a potential capacity of 6.4 GW.

By the end of 2030, the ORLEN Group will have renewable energy sources with a total capacity of 9 GW. Among them will be offshore and onshore wind farms, photovoltaics as well as biogas and biomethane generation units. During this time, the Group will also produce energy using small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs). ORLEN expects to cut the carbon intensity of its energy segment by 40% by 2030. In total, by the end of this decade, the Group will allocate as much as PLN 120bn for green investments.

Greenvolt Power is a Greenvolt Group company specialising in the development, construction and management of large-scale wind and solar projects, operating in most European markets and the US market. Greenvolt Group’s core business, the production of energy from waste biomass, is carried out in the Portuguese and UK markets. Poland is one of the key markets for the Greenvolt Group. The company currently has installation projects under development with a total capacity of 6.9 GW, of which 3.4 GW are being developed in Poland.

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SOURCE: ORLEN