The draft Order on the revision of the Connection Regulation has been made available for public consultation, and it provides for the increase of guarantees from 5% of the value of the connection tariff to 20%, announced the president of the National Energy Regulatory Authority, George Niculescu.
“At the beginning of the week, we declared that a new revision of the Connection Regulation would follow, in order to increase the financial guarantees for those who request the connection of electricity production projects to the grid. Today, the draft order was made transparent for decision-making, which provides for the increase in guarantees from 5% of the value of the connection tariff to 20% of the value of this tariff. And if someone is still willing to pay increased guarantees with the idea that they will settle them when the project is sold, we have put in place a safety measure: if the establishment authorization is not obtained within the established period of 12 months from the signing of the Connection Contract, the ATR is lost. So, we have left enough time for investors in good faith,” Niculescu wrote on his Facebook page, according to Agerpres.
He emphasized that for two years he has been talking about the huge ratio between megawatts on paper and those with financing that can “even see the light of day,” and that any greater financial guarantee scares off investors who are not serious and those who are not actually investors.
“I expect there to be two keys to reading this measure: 1. That it is the consequence of recent public statements about speculative ATRs. Here I can say that the first amendment to the Connection Regulation, the one that established this 5% level, was made in 2024, during my mandate. And I have been talking for 2 years about the huge ratio between megawatts on paper and those with financing, which can even see the light of day. 2. That it is a lot. That we will drive away investors. I am willing to any real and rational argument about how much these guarantees should be worth. What I am not willing to do are the tearful arguments about how any higher financial guarantee scares investors. Any higher financial guarantee scares investors who are not serious and those who are not actually investors. Serious energy investors will also pay for the guarantees, they will also bid for ATRs, because they want to do real business”, the head of ANRE pointed out.
According to the Approval Report, among the changes provided for in the project is the increase in the value of the financial guarantee established by users in order to issue ATRs for the connection of production/consumption and production sites with total approved capacities for evacuation greater than 1 MW, from 5% to 20% of the value of the connection tariff.
“The new value of the financial guarantee aims to: increase the degree of accountability of users requesting connection to the network; reduce the risk of speculative reservation of connection capacity; ensure efficient use of electricity network capacity; limit the financial risks borne by network operators in the event of project abandonment. The financial guarantee has the role of guaranteeing the fulfillment of the obligations assumed by users through the connection contract and limiting the risks generated by the non-completion of projects for which capacity has been reserved in the network”, the document states.
According to the cited source, in the case of projects for which the financial guarantee was established by applying the 5% percentage, projects that represent a percentage of 49% of the total number of projects with ATR issued, the situation on January 1, 2026 reported to ANRE by the network operators highlights the fact that in the case of 12% of these projects, connection contracts were concluded, in the case of 3%, connection contracts were concluded and construction permits were obtained, and in the case of a percentage of approximately 1%, connection contracts were concluded and construction and establishment permits were obtained.
“This evolution demonstrates that a fairly low percentage of projects have reached advanced stages of the connection process, even if the time for applying the guarantee rules since their entry into force was relatively short, approximately 16 months, compared to the duration of the connection process for projects with connection requests issued before August 2, 2024. At the same time, in the case of connection projects of production/consumption sites and production with installed capacities greater than or equal to 5 MW for which connection requests were submitted to the network operators before January 1, 2026, a number of 663 projects with a requested power for evacuation of approximately 57 GW have their solution studies submitted to the operators for their approval by June 30, 2026 at the latest,” the report also states.
Another amendment aims to supplement the Regulation and the Framework Connection Agreement with provisions relating to the establishment authorization issued by ANRE. The proposed amendments aim to: introduce the obligation of users to obtain the establishment authorization for energy capacities for electricity production; establish the deadlines within which this authorization must be obtained, namely within the maximum deadlines of 12 months from the date of conclusion of the connection agreement and 18 months from the date of issuance of the ATR (terms similar to those provided for in the Regulation for the transmission of the construction authorization for the facility); regulate the situations in which the failure to obtain the establishment authorization leads to the termination of the validity of the ATR and the connection agreement, as well as to the execution by the network operator of the financial guarantee provided by the user; introduce the withdrawal of the establishment authorization as a situation of legal termination of the connection agreement and the validity of the ATR, as well as of the execution of the financial guarantee provided by the user.
These provisions apply to energy capacities with an approved discharge capacity greater than 1 MW, given the significant impact of these projects on the capacity of the electricity networks.
“The analyses carried out by ANRE, based on information submitted by network operators, highlight the fact that in recent years there has been a significant increase in the number of connection requests for electricity production facilities, especially from renewable sources. At the same time, a significant part of the projects for which ATRs were issued have not advanced to the implementation phase, which leads to the blocking of the connection capacity available in the electricity networks and to the delay or impossibility of connecting other viable projects. In this context, the introduced measure constitutes, together with the user’s obligation to provide proof of obtaining the construction permit for the facility, a new criterion for selecting projects with economic capacity, given that proof of the financial capability to build production capacities by the project developer is a mandatory condition for obtaining the establishment permit,” the Order’s approval report explains.
The third change provided for in the draft refers to the clarification of the conditions for the return of the financial guarantee provided by the user in order to extend the deadline for submitting the construction permit for the facility at the production/consumption and production site to the network operator.
Thus, the obligation of the network operator to return the respective guarantee to the user within 10 days from the date on which he submits the construction permit for the facility was introduced. The introduction of this deadline was made following notifications received by ANRE for the purpose of clarifying the deadline for the return of the financial guarantee to the user who has fulfilled the obligation to submit the construction permit.
The draft also introduced provisions according to which the provisions regarding the increase in the percentage of the financial guarantee for the purpose of issuing the ATR do not apply to requests for which the network operator has communicated to the user, by the date of entry into force of the order, the value of the financial guarantee in accordance with the provisions of art. 18 para. (4) of the Regulation on the connection of users to public electricity networks.
The draft also provides for other provisions according to which the introduction of the user’s obligation to obtain the establishment authorization within a maximum period of 12 months from the date of conclusion of the connection contract and 18 months from the date of issuance of the ATR, as well as the measures provided for in the event of failure to fulfill that obligation, shall apply to users who conclude connection contracts with the network operator starting from the date of entry into force of the order.
At the same time, according to the draft, users who have concluded connection contracts with the network operator for the connection of production sites or consumption and production sites with an approved power for evacuation greater than 1 MW prior to the date of entry into force of the order, are obliged to obtain establishment permits within a maximum period of 12 months from the date of entry into force of the order. In case of non-compliance with the obligation, the issued ATRs cease to be valid and the concluded connection contracts cease by law.
Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan stated on Wednesday that the Executive will present, by the end of March, a plan of measures aimed at reducing prices in the electricity sector.
“We have a plan that we discussed with the minister (the Minister of Energy – ed.), which we will announce by the end of March, which aims to lower prices in the electricity sector. This decrease cannot be done overnight, but there are several important directions that we have discussed and that we will work on, so that we can have effects starting this year,” Ilie Bolojan said on Thursday at the Victoria Palace.
He specified that the measures aim, among other things, “unblocking network capacities.”
“So, the abolition of those ATRs that have covered, practically, our entire capacity for connecting to the electricity networks and we must free these networks to open the market for those who really want to invest and reduce costs,” Bolojan explained.