Electricity-generating homes hit 10,000 mark in Latvia

Take note – story published 1 year ago

In Latvia, microgeneration, or self-generation of electricity in households, is continuing to grow rapidly, mostly using solar panels. This week, the number of microgenerators connected to Latvia's electricity distribution network (Sadales tīkls, ST) has reached 10 000, with a total capacity of 80 megawatts (MW), ST said October 19.

With such total capacity, on a sunny summer day, it is possible to produce electricity corresponding to approximately 10% of total daily electricity consumption in Latvia, said ST.

According to the representatives of the ST, 2022 has become a turning point in the development of renewable energy sources (RES) in Latvia, particularly in terms of microgeneration development rates.

At the end of 2021, about 2,000 microgenerators were connected to the ST. The total number of microgenerators increased by 8,000 in less than 10 months this year.

"We have been lagging behind the development of the RES for many years in the Baltic States, but in the first half of this year, we outperformed Estonia at microgeneration development rates and are continuing this rapid rise. In fact, we've run a marathon like a sprint.

"Keywords for this achievement are collaboration and digitized processes. Cooperation between the electricity distribution operator, customers, and ministries, which prepared State aid programs for the installation of solar panels, as well as a fully digitized process of connecting micro-generators, allowed us to capture constant rapid rates of processing of each newly provided microgenerator connection application," said the ST statement.

99% of microgenerators connected to the ST are solar panels.

Data collected by the company show that the largest interest in self-generation of electricity in the household by installing solar panels is for customers in Rīga and in the municipalities near Rīga.

The largest number of solar microgenerators – approximately 1020 with a total capacity of approximately 8.2 MW – are installed in the Mārupe municipality, followed by Rīga with 860 microgenerators (total capacity approximately 6.9 MW), as well as Ropaži municipality with 660 (total capacity approximately 5.6 MW).

Seen a mistake?

Select text and press Ctrl+Enter to send a suggested correction to the editor

Select text and press Report a mistake to send a suggested correction to the editor

Related articles

More

Most important