Integrated systems are increasingly used in district heating systems; renewable, digitization, IoT, energy management, waste-to-energy are all systems that have recently defined global trends. “These are simple solutions, we have already reached the fifth generation with them and, here in Romania, we are somewhere in the second generation,” said Adrian Ciurtin, Country Management Partner, Ecovis Legal Romania, at the conference on digitalization and energy efficiency in Constanța, organized by Energynomics.
“There is a lot of interest in the market about renewable energy projects, driven by several factors. One of the factors is the Modernization Fund, whose functioning is provided for in Directive (EU) 2018/410 and in Regulation EU No 1001/2020. For all these reasons, projects are in a hurry, but not always money is available,” he said.
If a project requires co-financing, Ecovis proposes to conclude strategic partnerships between the park developer, EPC and the final purchaser or financier. “A first case is a variation from the standard approach, in which the developer brings the project to brownfield or ready-to-build stage and sells it to the investor; well, in this case, what we managed to create for investors is to guarantee the developer that the project will be brought to the operational phase, i.e. to commissioning and obtaining the manufacturer’s license.
DOWNLOAD THE PRESENTATION OF ADRIAN CIURTIN
The second type of partnership is more complex and involves obtaining long-term financing either from an investment bank or even a commercial bank. We hope that things will return to normal from the perspective of available debt acceptable for commercial banks. The third option is a variation – we managed to create a bridge loan – a mezzanine with the help of the EPC builder, who managed to mount the long-term financing, but conditioned by bringing the project to the operational stage; this means it is necessary to ascertain its complete viability. Another version we have implemented is an option desirable when there is no final purchaser yet. This last formula is suitable when a group of developers, together with an institutional or strategic investor, wants to develop an investment portfolio, and exit within 6-12 months of COD. In an open-book system, participants give up their margins and build a project at the cost level (-25% of the total, for example), and will capitalize on the project by selling it after COD with an addition of at least 45%. Find in our presentation the division of participation between partners as it resulted in one of our projects”, explained Ciurtin.
The conference “Digitalization and Energy Efficiency – the 5th year – Constanța” was organized by Energynomics, with the support of our partners Kawasaki Gas Turbines Europe, Wiren Energy.
More than 200 people registered on the MyConnector platform to participate in the dialogue.
