If "Sofia District Heating Company" stops working, Sofia will go into energy mode, as fires will start. The network is not designed for a load of 2000 megawatts.
This was said by the chairman of the Bulgarian Energy and Mining Forum Ivan Hinovski in the program "Bulgaria, Europe and the World in Focus" on Radio FOCUS.
A few days ago, experts from the organization presented a study on the topic "Integrated Development Program "Energy+".
One of the proposals is for the Bulgarian Energy Holding to become an operational holding. "Its current function as a financial holding was invented by Ovcharov at the time with the sole idea of securing the Belene project. Today it has new functions. We see in it the saving role for Toplofikatsiya Sofia. Toplofikatsiya Sofia is not an ordinary energy company, but a company critical to energy security. If it goes bankrupt, the capital will go bankrupt too," explained Hinovski.
According to him, the only option for saving Toplofikatsiya Sofia is recapitalization of the company. This can be done with funds from the Housing Renovation Fund, which amounts to 2.5 billion leva of state funds. Another part of the funds may come from the sale of the assets of one of the thermal power plants. "With these two steps, Toplofikatsiya Sofia can be restored." The other way is to pay from our own pockets“, added Ivan Hinovski.
Energy experts also propose concessioning geothermal waters. “Northern Bulgaria is extremely rich in low-potential geothermal water with a temperature of 60-70 degrees. It has high salinity and cannot be used for drinking or for SPA centers. Through heat pumps, this water can be used to build a large number of greenhouses for the production of vegetables, flowers, and even for intensive fish farming. This is an area where there will be jobs, there will be investments. The district heating companies in Razgrad and Shumen can become emission-free companies and the price of thermal energy can drop“, explained the expert and added that there is already a huge investment interest in participating in these water concession projects.
The Bulgarian Energy and Mining Forum also proposes an immediate moratorium on the construction of large photovoltaic capacities. "It is no secret that all large photovoltaic projects are foreign investors or local oligarchic structures with enormous pressure on the electricity companies. All those built so far have been built in violation of the main regulatory documents – they all have temporary connections, which is absolutely unacceptable", emphasized Ivan Hinovski.
Currently, there are 7 large photovoltaic power plants over 100 megawatts, which are difficult to manage. "We need to think about more baseload capacity and more regulating capacity. The indicators of our energy system are such that if it is turned off for any reason – frequency disturbance or balance disturbance, the entire energy system can collapse, everything can be turned off. That is why we propose that these large capacities stop degenerating“, explained the energy expert.
The experts propose that some of the units in the thermal power plants be reconstructed as gas modules, which are highly maneuverable and can participate in covering various peaks. “Between 19:00 and 22:00 the system experiences enormous difficulties, there is a lack of regulating capacities“, noted Hinovski.
The Bulgarian Energy and Mining Forum proposes the creation of a second energy exchange. “This will have a huge impact on the prices of the Bulgarian independent electricity exchange. This is a practice in all countries in Europe. In our country, this monopoly is due intentionally, at our expense“, added the expert.