Kazakh Senate passes draft law to promote renewable energy

Deputies of the Senate of the Kazakh Parliament adopted the law on introduction of changes and additions to some legislative acts of the Republic of Kazakhstan to promote the use of renewable energy sources and electricity during a plenary session in two hearings, Kazinform News Agency correspondent reports.

As the statement of the Committee on economic policy, innovative development and entrepreneurship reads, the law aims at bettering the existing legislation on the use of renewable energy sources.

The law introduces the notion of a small-scale renewable energy facility with a capacity of up to 200 KW in order to stimulate the use of renewable energy technologies among the population, SMEs and farms.

It also clarifies the concept of a net consumer as an individual or legal entity ensuring its own electricity or heat energy consumption fully or partly from small-scale renewable energy facilities.

Within the law, the net consumer is given the freedom not to register as an individual entrepreneur for generation of electricity or heat energy or sale of electricity generated by the renewable energy facility.

Also, the law sets out the obligations of energy supplying organizations at the legislative level when purchasing electricity from net consumers as well as these of power transmission organizations when connecting net consumers to electricity grids.

According to the law, net consumers are exempted from payment for transmitting electricity as well as free to sell electricity to small hydroelectric plants (up to 10MW) at cap rates.

The law also provides for crediting construction, reconstruction and modernization of heat supply systems and electricity networks of regional electric grid companies in communal ownership at the expense of budgetary funds.