North Macedonia gets first private wind farm

The wind farm, which has a total cost of 61 million euros, will be built 80 kilometres southeast of the capital Skopje near the village of Bogoslovec in northern Macedonia. Completion of the 36 MW project is scheduled for early 2023. Siemens Gamesa will install eight wind turbines with a rotor diameter of 145 metres and a hub height of 102.5 metres.

Bogoslovec is only the second wind farm ever in northern Macedonia, after the Bogdanci project, which was commissioned in 2015 by the state-owned utility ESM. Bogoslovec is one of the last wind farms in North Macedonia that will sell its electricity at a feed-in tariff under a 20-year power purchase agreement with the state market operator; North Macedonia has now introduced competitive auctions for market premiums.

This wind farm is expected to make an important contribution to North Macedonia's ambitious goals of converting the national electricity generation, which is still dominated by lignite, to green sources. The country aims to increase the share of renewable energy to over 50% by 2024, which means an additional 400 MW and 160 MW of solar and wind power, respectively.

“We at Erste Group are grateful that we had the opportunity to arrange financing for North Macedonia’s first significant private wind energy project. The Bogoslovec wind park marks another important contribution to the transition to greener energy in the West Balkans. We will continue supporting that transition across our core markets,” said Ingo Bleier, Chief Corporates & Markets Officer at Erste Group.