Operations start at GEN-I’s second large solar power plant in North Macedonia
Here at the GEN-I Group we have completed the construction of our second large solar power plant on the slopes of the foothills close to the town of Kavadarci in North Macedonia. After purchasing 70,000 m2 of heavily degraded (brownfield) land, we installed 17,612 photovoltaic modules with a total surface area of around 60,000 m2 and a maximum total power, depending on the weather conditions, of 12 MW. Depending on the number of hours of sunshine, these modules are capable of generating up to 15,500 MWh of carbon-free energy a year. Taking average consumption into account, this will meet the electricity needs of around 3,400 households, and lead to the production of 7,574 fewer tonnes of CO2 a year.
At the GEN-I Group, an internationally successful electricity trading company active on 24 wholesale markets, we are expanding our activities to cover renewable energy. We have already built more than 10,000 small solar power plants in Slovenia, and the large solar power plant at Kavadarci is the second one we have built abroad. The first was built in October 2022 in the village of Amzabegovo in the municipality of Sveti Nikole in North Macedonia. It has a total power of 17 MW and can generate up to 25,000 MWh of green energy. This means that we now generate enough electricity from these two plants to serve almost 9,000 North Macedonian households.
‘GEN-I is committed to creating a carbon-free future and protecting the planet. We have been known for many years as a supplier that only provides its customers with electricity that does not produce CO2 emissions. We are one of the leading energy companies in Central and South-Eastern Europe. With projects like the one in Kavadarci, we are increasing our investments in renewable sources. Investments such as these are becoming more and more common in North Macedonia, as they enable brownfield sites to be used for sustainable purposes, such as the production of solar power. At the GEN-I Group, we are intensively developing projects, through the construction of large solar power plants in Slovenia as well, that give new value to degraded land through the sustainable production of carbon-free energy, even in the face of complex spatial and regulatory expectations,’ explains GEN-I management board president Maks Helbl.
This, our second investment in North Macedonia, signals an expansion of our international portfolio of electricity generated from renewable sources of energy.