By 2050, the Croatian state-run power board HEP plans to produce 70 percent of its electricity from renewable sources, the company's CEO, Frane Barbaric, said on Thursday during a signing ceremony of an agreement on the construction of a solar power plant on the northern Adriatic island of Cres.

The Orlec Trinket solar plant will be the first in a series of planned power plants to be run on solar power and other other renewables.

The power plant will be built on an area of 42 acres, and will be capable of generating 6.5 megawatts of electricity, which is more than six times more than the largest existing plant of this type in the country. It will output an average of 8.5 million kilowatt hours a year, which is enough to power the annual needs of 2,000 households.

Barbaric said that this will be the first non-integrated solar power plant, and that it will contribute towards improving the essential infrastructure required to develop tourism on the islands of Cres and Losinj, as it should output sufficient amounts of electricity during the peak summer tourist season.

HEP will invest about 45 million kuna (€6.1 million) in the project, Barbaric said, and added that he hoped that this project would serve as an example for other potential investors in solar power plants.

Barbaric added that HEP is currently working on half a dozen major projects based on renewable energy sources.

HEP’s long-term strategy will aim to increase the share of power produced from renewable sources to 50 percent by 2030 and to 70 percent by 2050, he said.

(€1 = 7.37 kuna)

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