Poland wins emissions deal

An EU summit ended in a good deal for Poland, but the UN climate conference appeared to accomplish little
A draft compromise on CO2 emissions cuts, agreed upon at an EU summit in Brussels in December, states that Poland will receive up to 70 percent of its emission allowance for free. The exemption will be gradually phased out by 2020 and is considered a satisfactory improvement on the previous deal, which offered half the emissions allowance for free until 2016.

“Without doubt, [the summot] ended with our success,” said President Lech Kaczyński. Poland had threatened to veto the deal amid concerns that emissions credits would prove too expensive. Over 90 percent of Poland’s power comes from coal-dependent energy plants.

The draft deal creates a solidarity fund, retaining 10 percent of revenues from credit trading, which will be distributed among nine post-communist EU member states to help them invest in cleaner technologies.

An additional two percent of credit trading revenues will be divided among eastern EU members in recognition of the emissions reductions they achieved in the 1990s after the collapse of communism.

“The deal is flexible, allowing for the modernization of the Polish power sector and ensuring that there will not be any steep increase in electricity prices,” a Polish official told Reuters. In other news, on the sidelines of the UN climate change conference in Poznań, Poland entered into tentative agreements with Ireland and the World Bank, each of which will purchase carbon emission credits under the Kyoto Protocol. According to unofficial information, Ireland is ready to buy emission allowances worth EUR15 (zł.59.5) million, while the World Bank signed a separate deal to purchase 10 million tonnes of emissions for around EUR10 (zł.39.6) per tonne.

The Poznań summit finished with a proposal for a “Solidarity Partnership” declaration, but many delegates argued that too little had been done to move forward on climate-change countermeasures.

Source: By Marcin Poznan, Warsaw Business Journal

Vattenfall withdraws from its investment plans in Poland

The investor is discouraged with the attempts to reduce energy prices. The company does not trust the government any longer while the value of companies it was going to buy for PLN 1bn (EUR 247m) has dropped.

One of the successes of the Ministry of the Treasury was the agreement with Vattenfall to sell the remaining stake of GZE power plants and of Vattenfall Heat Poland.

“We have decided to withdraw from these transactions. The reason is the state policy towards energy prices regulations. The regulator supported by the government aims to force artificial price cut. We don’t trust Poland as we used to. We wouldn’t be surprised if it happened in Venezuela but it’s a shock here”, Torbjorn Wahlborg, Vattenfall Poland CEO said.

He added that the value of companies Vattenfall was going to buy dropped.

“The government cannot be as naïve as to believe that it may regulate energy prices and at the same time get from us prices negotiated in other market conditions”, Torbjorn Wahlborg added.

Two weeks ago, the energy regulator URE said that it won’t approve of energy prices above PLN 155 per MWh while next year’s contracts already amount to PLN 220-230 per MWh.

Vattenfall was supposed to pay over PLN 1bn for both stakes.

“We will wait till the end of the first quarter. Maybe the situation changes”, the CEO added.
Source:www.pb.p

Poland reiterates interest in new Lithuanian nuclear power plant, but only at high capacities

Participants of the new nuclear power plant project in Lithuania approved the power plant's projected capacity at above 3,000 MW, although the final capacity will depend on the evaluation of environmental impact of the project and Poland is reiterating its interest only in a large-scale project, said Pawel Urbanski, the president of Polish power grid operator Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne (PSE).

"The parties agreed to the option of more than 3,000 MW, though discussions continue," Urbanski told a press conference Thursday. "The work on the evaluation of the environmental impact needs to be done first. [...] We're interested only in a large project."

According to a Lithuanian bill on the new power plant that is supposed to replace the existing Ignalina plant, the new facility will have capacity of 1,600-3,200 MW. Latvia and Estonia have already declared an interest in the project, but Polish Economy Minister Piotr Wozniak said earlier Poland will not take part in the project if it is not guaranteed to get 1,200-1,600 MW of energy from the plant.

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PSE's vice-president Henryk Baranowski said Thursday the work on the environmental impact of the new power plant is going on, with the evaluation supposed to be ready by the end of the first half of 2008.

"It will later be the subject of consultations and should be approved by the end of 2008," Baranowski said.

Source: Interfax

Greenpeace protests over Poland's carbon output

Greenpeace activists climbed one of Europe's biggest power plants on Tuesday to demand that Poland's government do more to cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

Eleven people reached the top of the Belchatow power plant in central Poland -- home to some of the biggest carbon-emitting installations in Europe -- from where they slid down on ropes to paint "Stop CO2" on a smoke stack.

The Belchatow plant is Poland's biggest energy producer, using brown coal from Europe's largest open-cast mine.

The plant's spokesman, Jacek Michel, said its activities were not affected.

The Polish government is reviewing its energy policy to meet European Union requirements. But it has launched a legal challenge to the European Commission for setting carbon emissions limits that it says will hurt the country's economy.

Greenpeace said it wants the government to make renewable energy sources and energy savings a priority and stop producing 90 percent of its energy from coal, which emits large amounts of the greenhouse gas widely blamed for global warming.

"Our government is completely ignoring climate change, they don't do anything, pretend that this topic doesn't exist and insist on using the oldest and most polluting energy sources," Greenpeace spokeswoman Ewa Jakubowska said.

Belchatow spokesman Michel said Greenpeace was wrong to target the plant because it was producing only two-thirds of the carbon emissions to which it was entitled under EU rules.

Conservation group WWF published a report in May listing the top "Dirty Thirty" power stations in Europe and found Belchatow was the most polluting in absolute emission terms, pumping out 30.1 million tonnes of CO2 in 2006.

The report found that most of the 30, which together account for 10 percent of the bloc's CO2 emissions, were in Germany and Britain, which each had 10 of the least environmentally efficient carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions..

The two dirtiest power stations in the EU in relative terms -- grams of CO2 per kilowatt hour -- were in Greece, it said.

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