According to the Hungarian Ministry of Innovation and Technology, the country will receive 11.4 million euros from the European Union’s Modernization Fund to promote renewable energy generation in local communities.
The statement from the Ministry said that the innovative and modern projects to be financed were expected to contribute to Hungary’s goals of promoting renewables, decreasing greenhouse gas emissions, mitigating exposure to energy imports and helping households save on utilities.
Local energy communities enable prosumers to organize themselves and act collectively when consuming, selling, storing, or even sharing their energy. Hungary wants to encourage initiatives that ensure the local consumption of electricity on a renewable basis. Meanwhile, aggregators contribute to the balancing of the electricity system, which is necessary to ensure supply security given the proliferation of weather- dependent renewables. The tender is expected to be announced during the autumn.
Hungary accounts for 7.12 % of the Modernization Fund, which is recognized in the European Green Deal Investment Plan as one of the key funding instruments, supporting ten lower-income EU member states in their transition to climate neutrality by helping to modernize their energy systems and improve energy efficiency. The beneficiary member states are Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.