Bulgaria's TPP Maritsa Iztok 2 to Pay 153 Mln Euro for Emission Allowances by Mar 2019
Bulgarian state-owned thermal power plant (TPP) Maritsa Iztok 2 will have to pay over 300 million levs ($177.5 million/153.4 million euro) by March 2019 for buying emission allowances, energy minister Temenuzhka Petkova said on Tuesday. A working group within the energy ministry has drafted short and long term measures for strenghtening the financial state of the plant, Petkova said in a statement on Tuesday. The greenhouse gas emission allowances are part of the EU Emissions Trading System, which works on the “cap and trade” principle. Within the cap, companies receive or buy emission allowances which they can trade among themselves as needed. Each year companies must surrender enough allowances to cover all their emissions, otherwise fines are imposed.In the first half of the year, the plant booked 115 million levs in expenses for greenhouse gas emission allowances, according to its interim financial statement. Maritsa Iztok 2 has eight operating units with a total installed capacity of 1,620 MW.(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)