Zuzana Sasiak, expert at Polish Green Network and CEE Bankwatch Network: In Poland, creating energy communities is also difficult and chaos reigns

Raya Lecheva

In Poland, the creation of energy communities is also difficult and chaos reigns, it became clear from the words of Zuzana Sasiak, an expert at the Polish Green Network and the CEE Bankwatch Network, who took part in the webinar "Energy Communities: A Joint Approach to Tackling the Energy Crisis". Sasiak is a lawyer interested in environmental and climate protection, sustainable development and EU policy, she is an expert in European climate policy and energy democracy. Author and co-author of publications on energy communities, renewable energy and the transposition of the RED II Directive.

In Poland, there are already 20 established cooperatives, and in 12 out of 16 regions of the country there is support for energy communities. The main goal is to provide energy for rural areas and help the transition to RES in rural areas, because as I assume Bulgaria, Poland also has a problem with too strong urban development and backwardness of rural areas, commented Sasiak.

In October, the country passed a law on liberalization of legislation and a new type of energy communities has already been introduced, now there will be civil energy communities, after previously the communities were more energy clusters for the benefit of private companies and not cooperatives. You must avoid this chaos. In Poland, things are difficult, under the Recovery Plan, funding is aimed at energy clusters, not cooperatives, financial decisions are very important, our rulers prefer energy clusters for business, not for the common citizen, said Sasiak. In both Bulgaria and Poland, a large percentage of energy is from coal and the government is afraid of strikes, does not support energy cooperatives and consumer-producers, etc. prosumer.

In Poland, it is possible for neighbors to share energy, Zuzana Sasiak emphasized. So far in our country this has only been possible with direct cable, but now our legislation also allows energy to be shared in the community, it remains to be seen how this will happen with the by-laws.