PV energy in Hungary

General

According to the Directive 2009/28/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on the promotion of the use of energy from renewable sources the target for the share of energy from renewable sources in gross final consumption of energy in the year 2020 for Hungary is 13% (in the year 2005 the share was 4.3%).

Renewable electricity: PV

The Hungarian PV sector is growing slowly but the trend is stable. Year 2010 slightly better in this matter: the market grew by 35 kW and reached 1000 kWp.

Although in principle the access to the grid for solar systems in Hungary is guaranteed by law, systems of capacity exceeding 500 kWp need to obtain a permit from the Hungarian Energy Office. Small installations are subject to utility operator permit. There are six utility operators in Hungary, the biggest one - ELMÜ was pioneer in introducing simplified procedure for PV grid connection. As a result, most of the on-grid PV systems are located in the central region for which ELMÜ is responsible (over 70 with 200 kWp). Other utilities try to harmonize their procedures with this operator. The producer should declare that the electricity fed into the grid will not exceed 2/3 of the electric energy that he consumes. If it is not the case, than such installation would be treated like a small electric power station and stricter grid connecting technical requirements would apply. Major obstacle in grid connecting process in Hungary, same for systems of every size, is the Hungarian Certificate of the inverters. Such certificate is required by utilities operators before opening the access to their grid. Certificates are issued by the Hungarian Testing Laboratory. This requirement results in extra costs for investors.

In Hungary, electricity generated from RES  is promoted through a price-regulation in terms of a feed-in tariff. The Energy Office sets the period of payment and the maximum amount of eligible electricity in compliance with the statutory provisions (§ 11 (3) Act Nr. LXXXVI of 2007). From 2011 onwards the feed-in tariff for PV is: 29,84 HUF/kWh (0,11 €/kWh). FIT rates still do not satisfy the investors. The amount of payment is set annually and is adjusted to the rate of inflation. The period of payment is set by the Energy Office in line with the statutory provisions and shall not exceed the pay-off period of the system. The amount of payment varies according to three periods of the day, however for PV it is constant.

Future programme changes expected

As regards the policy framework, promotional schemes are being used and refined, and subsidies are available under certain conditions for the development of RES. Until 2020, Hungary aims at covering 13% to 15% of its energy demand from renewables. Most of the excess capacity will be provided for by new biomass power plants.

So far the capacity of 1 MWp was installed in 2010. It is estimated that total contribution from PV energy in Hungary will reach 19 MWp in 2015 and meet the binding target of 63 MWp in 2020.

According to Hungarian NREAP PV will be developed in order to advance electrification of remote areas. Hungary sees an opportunity for further PV deployment in the provisions of the Directive 2002/91/EC on the energy performance of buildings. Most of the domestic applications were designed to provide autonomous power supply by using suitable storage batteries.

According to Sanyo, its new HIT N (N type modules from Sanyo are already in production and the HD type will be available) Series 240W crystalline-based photovoltaics (PV) module has also achieved the greatest efficiency of any other module on the market, at 19 percent. Currently undergoing commercialization, it is scheduled to be on sale in Europe from early next year. The product will be manufactured in its factory in Hungary, which is currently undergoing a capacity expansion from 165 MW to 315 MW.

Sources

www.pv-nms.net/

National Renewable Energy Action Plan for Hungary. 2010. URL: http://ec.europa.eu/energy/renewables/transparency_platform/doc/national_renewable_energy_action_plan_hungary_hu.pdf

http://www.pv-magazine.com/news/details_/beitrag/sanyo-216-percent-cell-efficiency-not-independently-verified--but-company-confident_100001753/8/

http://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/refsys/pdf/PV-Report2009.pdf

http://www.eh.gov.hu/gcpdocs/201101/honlaprafeedintariffshu_from_20110101_105.xlsx

Institute for Renewable Energy, Poland.

 This information can be referenced without permission provided that the source is mentioned completely and correctly: 'Interactive EurObserv'ER Database, http://www.eurobserv-er.org

date of last update: 1^st March 2011

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The EurObserv'ER barometer is a project supported by the European Commission within the DG TREN 'Intelligent Energy Europe' programme and by Ademe, the French Environment and Energy management Agency. The EurObserv'ER Barometer is the result of the investigation and research work of its authors. The European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.