Status of integrating renewable electricity production in Greece, prospects and problems

Greece, as member of the European Union follows the European policies regarding compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, as expressed by the draft directive of 2001 on "A framework for greenhouse gas emissions trading within the European Community". Accordingly, it is proposed that 38% of the CO₂ emissions in EU should be included in the quota system by 2010, with a penalty of 50 euro/tn of CO₂ exceeding the quota [1]. The state target of Greece is 20.1% RES penetration in Electricity production amounting to 14.5 TWh per year [1, 2]. In this paper, the legal and financial framework for RES, the current level of installations, the problems faced by the new installations and the potential benefits from their installation are described.