On 3 March Mr. Plamen Popov, Managing Director of Statkraft South East Europe and Mr. Simen Braein and Mr. Stephane Barbeau from Statkraft AS Norway paid a visit to the Secretariat. Statkraft’s involvement in the South East Europe region and its assessment of the state of play stood at the centre of discussions. Statkraft regularly takes part to the Athens Forum meetings.

The discussions were kicked off by a presentation about the Statkraft. During the last decades Statkraft has grown from a domestic hydro power generator to a globally operating consortium. Following the EU 2020 renewable energy target, Statkraft sees great business opportunities in the area of renewable energy and energy efficiency. Statkraft believes that the EU´s target of 20% renewable energy consumption by 2020 imply doubling of the renewable power generation over the next 10-12 years.

Statkraft is involved as a trader as well as investor in the South East Europe. It sees a large potential in hydro in the region. Energy mix targets apart, Statkraft believes that hydro from the Energy Community can compete against wind from the Western Europe. At the same time, lack of power exchange, absence of retail markets and confusing capacity allocation modalities is still characteristics for the region. Prices are severely distorted and do not match with demand and supply. When assessing country risk, Statkraft not only examines the legal framework, but looks into a long list of factors in relation to political and operational risks. In other words, non-energy risks are decisive for the investment decision.