Croatia's Hrvatska Elektroprivreda (HEP) power company on Monday signed agreements on cooperation in the development of solar power plant projects with six municipalities and one city, and the total power of the plants HEP will build is 60 MW, with investments estimated at HRK 380 million.

An agreement on cooperation in the development of solar power plant projects has been signed with the municipalities Vrpolje, Lovinac, Orle, Zdenci, Satnica Djakovacka, Trpinja, and the city of Valpovo.

This is a continuation of cooperation with municipalities and cities with which HEP concluded agreements on the development of 11 solar power plant projects in 2019 and 2020. Those projects are part of HEP’s total planned investments in nearly 350 MW of solar power plants in the period 2019-2030.

Economy Minister Tomislav Coric said that he was pleased with the fact that over the past few years HEP had signed agreements with 18 local government units, establishing cooperation on the implementation of such projects and confirming once again the direction of investing in renewable energy sources.

HEP has thus, the minister said, given additional impetus to national plans for Croatia’s development, which are confirmed by the energy development strategy, and that is promotion of renewable sources on the one hand and low-carbon society on the other.

He explained that each kilowatt-hour more which will be generated in coming year from renewable energy sources, meant a lower entry price due to the fact that fossil fuels were currently making electricity production and delivery much more expensive than two or three years ago.

The chairman of HEP’s management board, Frane Barbaric, said that this was successful continuation of cooperation between HEP and the 18 local government units. To date, he said, agreements have been signed with them for the construction of power plants of 168 MW in total, which is a billion kuna investment.

According to him, that is the continuation of HEP’s business strategy that by 2030 Croatia will have around 350 megawatts from renewable energy sources.