Support schemes
- Quota system: In Poland, the main incentive for renewable energy use is a quota system in terms of a quota obligation, which is combined with a certificate trading system. The Energy Law obliges electricity generators and suppliers that provide electricity to customers in Poland to fulfil a specified quota of certificates of origin/ green certificates. These certificates are awarded to the producers of electricity from renewable sources.
- Loans: The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management grants low-interest loans to renewable energy and CHP projects.
- Tax incentives: Producers of electricity from renewable sources are exempt from the tax on the sale and consumption of electricity.
- Subsidy: The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOSiGW) grants low interests loans together with subsidies to support the purchase and installation of small and micro-RES installations for the needs of residential single-family or multi-family houses.
Heating and Cooling
- Subsidies: There are three subsidy schemes for heat from renewable energy sources.The subsidy schemes focus on refurbishment work and purchase and installation of solar collectors and of small and micro-RES installations.
- Loan: The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management grants low-interest loans to projects in the field of renewable energy sources and CHP.
Transport
- Biofuels quota obligation: The producers, importers and suppliers of fuels are obliged to meet an annual quota of biofuels in the total amount of liquid fuels produced/supplied/imported. The obligation levels are determined every three years for a period of 6 years by the Council of Ministers.
Feed in tariffs
Poland adopted a new Renewable Energy Sources Act (RES Act 2016) that replaced the quota system by an auctions-based scheme and came into force in July 2016. Until that date, the support scheme was based on a quota obligation system and certificates of origin for renewables and CHP as well as a purchase obligation for energy distributors (Energy Law of 1997, amended in 2005).
Under this new RES act, auctions are separately held for installations with capacity below 1MW and for those that are larger than 1MW. The winners of the auctions will receive either a feed-in tariff (installation below 500kW) or a premium (installations above 500kW) over a 15-year period.
Last update: 07 2023