Business news from Ukraine

Canada’s Refraction Asset Management has invested about EUR 11 million in the construction of a solar power plant in the town of Nikopol, Dnipropetrovsk region, Head of Dnipropetrovsk Regional State Administration Valentyn Reznichenko has said.
“It is now the most powerful solar power plant in the region built by an investor. It took almost 11 million euros to build it. Over 32,000 panels were placed on 15 hectares of land. The plant’s capacity is up to 80 megawatts of electricity per day,” he said, noting that the power generated by the plant can be enough for almost 12,000 apartments within a month.
“There are already two solar power plants in the region – in Pidhorodne and Nikopol. Not a kopeck of budget funds was spent on their construction, all at the expense of the investor,” Reznichenko said.
According to a representative of Refraction Asset Management, Ivan Bachynsky, Nikopol was chosen as the site for the construction of a power plant, since it is one of the sunniest localities in the region.
“This is the first capital investment by our company in Dnipropetrovsk region. There is an understanding with the regional leadership on the further development of eco-energy,” Bachynsky said.

National energy company Ukrenergo will initiate the transfer to Regulatory Asset Base (RAB) from 2019, the state-owned enterprise has said in a press release.
The press release recalled that the company is to appraise its assets and implement the investment program for the year preceding the switch to RAB by at least 95% for transfer to RAB tariffs.
Ukrenergo will focus on the implementation of the above-mentioned conditions and will initiate its switch to RAB in 2019 with the regulator.
“The introduction of RAB will allow Ukrenergo to operate more flexibly and play by the same rules with our European partners. One more desirable step for us from the regulator should be the transition to the approval of investment programs not for the coming year, but at least for the three or five years. This planning horizon will make the company more understandable for creditors, as the implementation of most projects is designed for several years” Ukrenergo Head Vsevolod Kovalchuk said.
RAB regulation applies almost in each European country. It allows attracting investment into power lines and increasing the quality of servicing. Ukrenergo operates trunk and interstate power grids, as well as performs the centralized dispatching of the united energy system in the country. The company is a state-owned enterprise. It is subordinate to the Ministry of Energy and Coal Industry.

Nibulon plans to build a new transshipment terminal in Ternivka (Zaporizhia region), according to the website of Zaporizhia Regional State Administration.
According to the report, head of the administration Kostiantyn Bryl discussed with the company representatives the procedure of land allocation, energy supply, the need for dredging, other problems.
“Before building anything, you need to do a lot of work with documents, coordinate and resolve problematic issues. Well-coordinated work on the creation and processing of documentation that will not violate the law are now required from a large number of government instances,” he said.
Nibulon LLC was established in 1991. It is one of the largest operators in the grain market of the country. It has elevators with a total capacity of about 2 million tonnes, as well as its own transshipment terminal with a capacity of 5 million tonnes in Mykolaiv.