Bulgaria’s rapidly expanding battery-storage market is putting pressure on the government to reform environmental product fees that industry representatives say have become disproportionately expensive for stationary storage projects.
The Bulgarian Association of Electrical Engineering and Electronics, BASEL, says industrial batteries are currently subject to a charge of around €2.81/kg. The comparable rate in Romania is about €0.20/kg, leaving the Bulgarian charge roughly 14 times higher.
The issue has become increasingly material as investment has accelerated. Bulgaria moved from almost no battery-storage capacity at the beginning of 2024 to approximately 8.6 GWh by May 2026. A fee that previously represented a relatively minor regulatory expense can therefore translate into a significant cost across utility-scale installations.
BASEL is proposing a dedicated rate of €0.30/kg for lithium-ion batteries used in stationary storage. It also wants the charge calculated only on battery cells and modules rather than on the total weight of a project, which can include containers, inverters, transformers, cables, cooling equipment and fire-protection systems.
The association is also seeking lower fees for solar modules and inverters, arguing that environmental charges should more closely reflect the actual costs of collection, treatment and end-of-life recycling. At the same time, it wants stricter enforcement against companies placing equipment on the market without declaring it or paying the required charges.
Bulgaria’s Environment and Water Ministry published a revised version of amendments to the product-fee ordinance on 17 August, but battery charges were excluded from that package and are expected to be addressed separately. No timetable has been given.
For developers, the debate is increasingly a question of project economics rather than simply environmental administration. As the country’s storage fleet moves into the multi-GWh range, weight-based charges can materially affect capital costs and potentially influence where regional battery investment is deployed.
