Not a good time for domestic PV as the Ukraine crisis moves on

The situation in Ukraine is threatening the European country’s incipient PV industry as the necessary changes in Crimea take place. Employees in the PV industry’s is not the greatest position and the people there have been wrecked by the country’s crisis. PV magazine reveals the opinions of two anonymous employees from Activ Solar. As one of them reports, Vienna-based Activ Solar has no future projects and they are cutting people off. “A lot of people were already fired. For me, the last day in this company is known as well,” were his words. The other source said the same thing and he added that “the company is now optimizing costs at all levels with no additional staff, except maintenance for the existing plants.”

The company finished the work on a 69.7 MW PV facility in Crimea. Moreover, Activ Solar was amog the best PV developers in Ukraine as they planted 127 MW of capacity only in Q1 2013.

The most Active domestic PV company in Ukraine has troubles

As far as the future plans are concerned, the company says: “The current political instability and the ensuing tensions have caused a severe disruption of economic activity in Ukraine. We are closely monitoring the ongoing political discussions and developments. We expect the situation to remain difficult for the foreseeable future causing a slowdown in economic activities. In this environment of sustained uncertainty, Activ Solar remains cautious regarding undertaking new projects until the situation in the country stabilizes,” as PV magazine reports.

The ongoing projects are not being stopped but the future ones don’t have the same fate. “The current Crimean government has already commented on solar parks in Crimea, saying that now they are a vital part of the energy infrastructure in the peninsula and will continue to generate power. However, the question is open as to who pays for the solar electricity and at what rate. Most of the solar projects in Crimea were financed by Russian banks so I would assume that very soon we will see a sudden growth of the cumulative solar capacity in Russia.”

PV in Crimees no longer bought

Energorynok’s officially announced this month that they no longer buying energy made in Crimea. The energy company in Ukraine says that the country adopted the draft resolution with 9 out of 9 votes.

The COO at Hamburg-based Enerparc, the company that installed Russia’s biggest power plant says that. “All the power plants in Crimea have been annexed by the Russians so they are not being paid by the Ukrainian government. And there is no discussion as to what will happen with the plants if they degrade, even if the plants are now Russian.”