Cleantech Volume 5

Cleantech Coal

LEADING

YOU COST A LOT

LADIES

FALL 2013

Efficiency

LOW CARBON ACTION

USA $18 - $18CAD - POLAND 50 PLN + VAT - EU €12 - UK £11

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The Leading Ladies of

CLEANTECH

American Girl in Italy, a classic conceptual photo from the 1950s, taken by photographer Ruth Orkin, shows a woman in a man’s world, walking down the street as an object to be admired. We wanted to re-create this historic image with a modern Cleantech interpretation. Instead of men, we selected all women, leaders in their professions, and placed them in a charming Warsaw urban landscape. The young girl represents the future of sustainable development.

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A g AtA W r ó b e l ( P o l n o r d ) AgnieszkA kozłoWsk A-korbicz (Ministry of environMent) A n e tA W i ę c k A

( i n s t i t u t e o f r e n e WA b l e e n e rg y )

A n n A c z y ż ( H Ay s P o l A n d ) d e v i n s Ay l o r ( s k A n s k A ) e WA ru t koWs k A - s u b o c z ( d e n to n s ) isAbelle clerc (AeW euroPe) JoAnnA scHulders (ubM PolskA) JoAnnA Wis-bieleWicz (tuP) k AtA r z y n A z AW o d n A ( s k A n s k A ) k i n g A A n A s i e W i c z - z A r ę b A ( v e s tA s ) k i n g A n o WA ko W s k A ( c A P i tA l PA r k ) MAgdAlenA stretton (ArcAdis) reginA gul (Jones lAng lAsAlle) r e n AtA k u s z n i e r s k A ( d t z ) svetlAnA robinson (future4build)

letter

Cleantech editor in chief Wojciech Kość

Publisher

Parker Snyder

art direction Jacek Kultys

Graphic designer Ola Foryś

executive networking reinvented

design concept

Agata Kubień, Pascal Guiter

KEY ACCOUNT

Maja Sobieszczak

principal Analyst Tobiasz Adamczewski

WRITERS

Tobiasz Adamczewski, Pablo Castellanos, Hunter Diamond, Maciej Gomółka, Piotr Wdowiński, Grzegorz Wiśniewski

PHOTOGRAPHY

Karol Grygoruk, Szymon Szcześniak, 50Hertz , Cezamat, Danish Wind Association, DLA Piper Wiater, iStockphoto, KL Gates, Klus Design, Martifer Solar, Ministry of Environment, MPTec, Photopin, Photogenica, Poleko, Prime Minister’s Office, SSW, Salans, UNFCCC

Editorial contact

wojciech@cleantechpoland.com (+48) 602 458 099

Advertising contact

parker@cleantechpoland.com (+48) 517 469 881

General requests

info@cleantechpoland.com

printeR

Drukarnia Beltrani Kraków

Published by

Cleantech Poland LLC Ul. Pustelnicka 48/22 04-138 Warsaw, Poland

Dear Colleagues, On October 16th, Warsaw’s executives will attend an event unlike anything they’ve been to before.

Cleantech and Future4Build have teamed up to create an annual event called PRESIDENT’S CLUB, designed for executives in the sectors that connect environment and business. They are the asset managers, architects, developers, distributors, manufacturers and power producers from companies who are moving Poland in sustainable direction. The PRESIDENT’S CLUB is a new, five-star, closed, and highly privileged networking opportunity for executives at the crux of environmental sustainability.

Why go? If you’re a CEO, managing director, country manager or a board president, you have little time and lots of events to choose from. But rarely, if ever, are you at an event that’s only attended by executives like yourself.

This year’s theme is Leading Ladies and the night is dedicated to the achievements of female professionals. At the PRESIDENT’S CLUB, we will present 16 top ladies in those sectors connecting environment and business. Among the companies and organizations represented: AEW Europe, Arcadis, Capital Park, Dentons, Future4Build, Hays, Renewable Energy Institute, Jones Lang LaSalle, Ministry of Environment, Skanska, TUP, UBM and Vestas.

Presidents, managing directors and CEOs, look forward to your invitation.

Kindest Regards,

Parker Snyder Cleantech

Svetlana Robinson Future4Build

www.cleantechpoland.com | 5

opinion

By wojciech kosc

Who likes

their butt kicked Poland shouldn’t wait until higher coal prices and tougher climate politics force its energy sector to innovate. This would be like acting only after someone kicks your butt, which often comes too late to achieve any decent outcome.

Plentiful and cheap. These are two fundamentals of Poland’s coal resources. Because coal is cheap and plentiful, it has remained a staple of the Polish energy mix.

Even the most radical, but still possible, future scenarios showing where Poland will get its energy from don’t dismiss coal-fired power completely. They do, however, revise what’s been commonly accepted and what many are taking for granted: that Poland has enough coal to fire tens of gigawatts of power generation capacity for decades to come.

The abundance of coal isn’t a given anymore. The coal is there beneath the ground, but producing it requires overcoming several key technical, economic and societal challenges. Readily extractable lignite is running out, and by 2050, if no new lignite plays are brought into production, Poland could abandon the resource altogether. Not an unlikely scenario, as there’s a strong opposition to new open-cast lignite coal mines from communities and local governments.

Hard coal has been more handily depleted by industry and getting to new resources would be quite complicated and therefore costly.

Let’s work out an energy mix that has a place for coal but is relying on localized and varied energy sources: gas, wind, water, biomass and solar

6 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

If you watched the movie “The Kingdom” on the US involvement with Saudi Arabia, you will know that the oil price shock that OPEC delivered to the Western world was one of prime boosts for innovation that led to advances in saving energy. Today’s cars and domestic devices use a fraction of energy that they did 40 years ago.

In Poland, coal might be in its last years of being relatively cheap. Our lead feature on page 22 takes a look at studies and data that provide pretty solid argumentation that coal-based energy generation has in fact consumed billions in subsidies (so subsidies aren't renewablesspecific) and does not consider the added cost of health care due to air pollution.

If a price shock is on the cards it’s best not to wait until it arrives.

Let’s work out an energy mix that has a place for coal but is otherwise relying on decentralized and varied energy sources: gas, wind, water, biomass and solar. Renewables keep getting cheaper: wind power is almost at parity with coal in cost per megawatt.

"A passive and conservative policy preserving the Polish energy sector will expose us to price risk of coal on the world markets, and to antiemission regulations in Europe and globally. It will limit possibilities in using technological innovations in low-emissions technologies of generating heat and energy,” Polish think tank Institute for Structural Research wrote recently.

Right on. The ball’s still in our court, but that won’t be long.

Partners

To become a partner for the magazine please contact the publisher

AmCham is a business organization that serves and promotes its member companies.

Ul. Emilii Plater 53, Warsaw www.amcham.com.pl

Cleantech Poland connects capital and ideas in Poland’s conversion to a low carbon economy.

Ul Krucza 51/31, Warsaw info@cleantechpoland.com PwC provides services in assurance, advisory and tax & legal. A global services company, PwC has been in Poland for 20 years.

Al. Armii Ludowej 14, Warsaw www.pwc.pl SSW provides comprehensive tax and legal advisory services, counting large energy companies as clients.

Rondo ONZ 1, Warsaw www.ssw.pl

Company index A Abener p. 55, AEW Europe, p. 5, 45, 53, n AIG/Lincoln Polska, p. 73, Alstom Power, p.

21, 55, AMB Energia, p. 42, Ansaldo, p. 55, Apex Contracting, p. 41, ApSICXbench, p.

55, Arcadis, p. 5, 45, ArcelorMittal Poland, p.

21, Arkady Sobieskiego, p. 72, Asbud, p. 70, B Bankwatch, p. 17, Bireta, p. 41, 55, BMW, n p. 21, BOŚ, p. 64, Bouygues Immobilier, p.

70, n C Capital Park, p. 5, 39, 45, 53, 61, 67, 72, Carbon Disclosure Project, p. 20, Carlsberg, p. 30, 33, Clean Sea Project, p. 40, Client Earth, p. 80, COP 19, p. 76, n D Dąbrowski Finance, p. 36, Dentons, p. 5, 45, 46, DONG, p. 36, DTZ, p. 45, 53, n E Echo Investment, p.

65, 68, 70, 71, 73, ECI, 70, EIP, p. 36, 77, Energa, p. 25, Ernst&Young, p. 25, EU ETS, p.

24, EC, p. 15, EIB, p. 17, 28, Eurostat, p. 15, F Fabryka Biznesu, p. 72, Future4Build, p. 5, n 45, 53, 56, n G Gazprom, p. 11, GCCA, p. 30, General Motors, p. 21, Ghelamco, p. 39, 73,

8 | CLeantech |fall 2013

Can't remember where a company was mentioned?

Here's our index to help you out.

74, Gillette, p. 32, Global Energy, p. 36, Golub GetHouse, p. 71, Greenpeace, p. 11, Greenwings Offices, p. 68, n H Hays, p. 5, 41, 45, 46, HB Reavis, p. 39, HEAL, p. 26, Helsinki Commission, p. 40, Hitachi Zosen Inova, p.

55, Hochtief, p. 55, n I Iberdrola, p. 36, IEO, p.

5, 13, 17, 45, 53, Inst for Structural Research, p. 6, IAEA, p. 16, International Paper, p. 21, J John Nurminen Foundation, p. 40, JLL, 5, n 45, JRC, 15, JW Construction, p. 64, K Kaspersky Labs, p. 21, KOBIZE, p. 15, n Kulczyk Investments, p. 25, 80, Kulczyk Silverstein, p. 39, n L Legia, p. 30, LOT, p. 21, M Make Consulting, p. 18, Mars Inc, p. 35, n Min of economy, p. 12, 25, Min of environment, p. 5, 21, 45, 53, 76 n N National Library, p. 35, NEDO, p. 35, NFOŚiGW, p. 26, 64, O OKRE Development, p. 68, 69, n P PGE, p. n 16, 21, 25, 29, PHN, p. 66, 67, 68, 72, PIGEO, p. 12, PKP, p. 34, Podlasie Solar Park, p. 42,

Poland Shale Coalition, p. 41, Polenergia, p.

25, 28, 29, Polimex, p. 55, PPE, p. 14, Polnord, p. 5, 45, 53, Pöyry, p. 40, Procter&Gamble, p. 32, PSE, p. 14, PSE Operator, p. 14, PZFD, p. 64, n Q Qumak Sekom, p. 30, n R Rospuda, p. 80, n S Savills, p.

39, 74, Schneider Electric, p. 30, SDL Trados Studio, p. 55, SGB Fortune MA, p. 68, Shell, p. 11, Siemens, p. 55, Sita Zielona Góra, p.

55, Skanska, p. 5, 39, 45, 46, 53, 61, 66, 68, 69, 72, Solarpraxis, p. 77, 78, SSW, 41, SwedeCenter, p. 58, 66, 77, n T Tauron, p. 25, Tech Pompe, p. 41, Terrapinn, p. 55, Tesco, p.

30, The Linde Group, p. 41, Trane, p. 32, TriGranit, p. 34, TUP, p. 5, 45, 53, 60, n U UBM, p. 5, 45, 46, 65, 73, UEFA, p. 30, Union Investment, p. 63, UN, p. 26, UOS, p. 77, USGBC, p. 58, n V Vantage Development, p.

71, Vestas, p. 5, 45, 53, n W Warsaw Polytechnic, p. 55, WSE, p. 36, n Y Yareal, p. 71.

44

p/22

Coal is expensive, Wind is cheap

p/28

Interview POLENERGIA

p/30

Low Carbon Leaders - Energy Efficiency p/38

FITs, for real this time?

NEW RES PROPOSAL p/4 0 Waste into Water Baltic pollution

38

p/4 2

Not giving up PV Investment

p/4 4

Leading LADIES p/57 GREEN BUILDING SPECIAL SECTION p/5

PRESIDENT’S CLUB Svetlana Robinson Parker Snyder

p/6 OP-ED Who likes their butt kicked? p/8

PARTNER’S PAGE p/10 Photo ESSAY

p/12

INDICATORS

RES Development Certificates of origin Price of electricity Carbon price Currency rates / 1 3 Expert guest: Grzegorz Wisniewski / 1 4 Heat & power by type Electric power by type Co-firing by the numbers / 1 5 CO2 emissions Emissions by origin Poland’s emissions vs. targets Poland’s emissions vs. GDP

p/65 GREEN BUILDING DIRECTORY p/76

COP 19 Can Poland pull it off ?

p/7 7

Business mixer Pictorial

p/78

Marcin Stoczkiewicz Client Earth, Portrait

www.cleantechpoland.com | 9

contents

Contents

p/16 Trending

10 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

photo essay

By K r z y s z t o f m . R at s c h k a

Gazprom, Shell under pressure A woman who has her body covered in “oil” during a Greenpeace demonstration in Warsaw, August 2013. Elsewhere, Greenpeace is campaigning against Gazprom and Shell plans to drill for oil and gas in the Arctic. In August, Greenpeace unfurled a remotely controlled “Save the Arctic” banner during a Shell-sponsored Belgian Formula 1 Grand Prix as worldwide television coverage began. In September, Greenpeace activists were arrested after they scaled Gazprom’s oil platform in the Arctic Sea. They face charges of terrorism.

www.cleantechpoland.com | 11

I nd I ca t o r s POLAND

RES DE V ELO P MEN T Wind

a n a ly s t ' s V IEW

MW

Hydro

-1-

Biomass

Biogas

Solar

6000 4,400 MW TOTAL

Source: ure

3000

0 2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013 Q2 2013

2012 has seen the greatest year on year increase of installed RES capacity thus far. Despite legislative instability new power is coming online and already in the first half of 2013 over 300 MW of wind power and 120 MW of biomass has been installed.

C e r t i f i c at e s o f o r i g i n

The first half of 2013 did not bring

Green certificate PLN / MWh

179.35

139 100.48

0 Oct 2012

Dec 2012

Feb 2103

Apr 2013

Jun 2013

Source: polish power exchange

Trading suspended

302

Aug 2013

Market prices of green certificates have recovered from the PLN 100.48 low from the beginning of the year. However, until there is a system reform, the sector will remain in a slump. PIGEO assesses the oversupply as of 2013 to be approximately 5.3 TWh.

Price of Electricity

MOVING AVG. WEEKLY PRICE PLN / MWh

118.37

100

165.80

Jan 2013

Mar 2103

Apr 2013

May 2013

Jun 2013

Jul 2013

The slowing economy is reflected in the price of electricity. The price of electricity is about 120 PLN/MWh and should be 200 PLN/MWh to make investments attractive.

CARBON P RICE 12

EUAs

Source: polish power exchange

300

200

Tobiasz Adamczewski P r i n c i p a l A n a ly s t

optimism to the Polish RES market.

The support system has not been reformed and co-firing along with old hydro power plants are eating up most of the system’s quota. Hence, the price of certificates of origin from RES remains in a slump.

Thanks to previously planned investments, 300 MW of wind and 120 MW of dedicated biomass power have been installed over the past six months. However, it is expected that the installation rate will not match up to 2012 levels and will fall in the near future. Legislative and political instability is to blame.

The ministry of economy has recently announced that the RES reform will move away from the quota system until 2021 towards an auction system.

Investors will be competing for a 15 year energy price guarantee. Political events, with MPs leaving the governing party, raised the question whether the PO-PSL coalition will be able to hold on to power and pass legislation still planned for 2013.

In these indicators, we take a closer look at co-firing in the RES-support scheme and present some basic facts about Polish emission trends. After all, the Warsaw climate conference is only a month away.

C U RRENCY RAT ES

futures

€ / ton of CO2

CERs

4.50

9.47

€ EUR

POLISH ZŁOTY (PLN)

$ USD 4.26

4.22

9 2.86 0.62

0 Oct 2012

12 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Mar 2012

3.50

Aug 2013

3.37

3.18 Source: NBP

3

4.43

Source: CONSUS

6

2.50 Oct 2012

Mar 2012

Aug 2013

I nd I ca t o r s E x p e r t gu e s t Cleantech asked Grzegorz Wiśniewski, CEO of Institute of Renewable Energy, for a comment on the government’s plans for an overhaul of the support system for renewables, where companies will receive feed-in-tariffs with a price set at auction.

Grzegorz Wisniewski CEO o f T H E I n s t i tut e o f R e n e wa b l e E n e rgy

What’s the just announced

support system about?

It’s difficult to speak about something that is still an idea, even if its assumptions have been made public. I think there are reasons to be concerned, unfortunately. We still don’t know what the goals of the new system are. I’m also concerned about the rather opaque manner in which the government has been working on this new proposal.

By comparison, the work on the new law on renewable sources of energy, which resulted in a draft version we know now, was difficult, but at least it was transparent and there was no question who the author was. Previously, the government assumed that the new law would be an evolutionary step in perfecting the system so that the support would differ for different types of renewable energy. Still, it took the government three years and the law is not ready today.

Now, as the government announced a completely new idea for the support system, you may expect that it will take even more time to do. The lost time is impossible to make up for. Poland cannot afford three more years of discussion.

What are the main differences between the current RES support system and the auction-based system?

The current system of green certificates has one part of the revenue of re

newable energy producers linked to the energy market, while the other part is linked to the market of certificates, which is based on an assumption that Poland will achieve a certain amount of renewable energy that is fixed for several years ahead.

The planned auction system is detached from the energy market. A government agency will organize auctions for the supply of energy for the next 15 years and these will be sold at auction to the company who submits the lowest price. So the new system is more like a feed-in-tariff system for selected beneficiaries, unlike the more market-based system of certificates.

The current system doesn’t work well in Poland, but the proposed system isn’t going to work better.

Why won’t it work?

In theory, under the new system auctions would be organized for all technologies or specifically for particular technologies. The first solution, which is more likely to happen, isn’t going to work and, contrary to what neoliberals would like to think, would in fact be anti-market, because it would eliminate all technologies, except for 2-3 cheapest large-scale technologies, which would take over the entire market after a few auctions. This would not help lower costs in the long run, either.

If auctions were organized for different technology types or installations’ size, it would give politicians a possibility to decide what technologies would compete for energy volumes, set reference costs etc. The auction system eliminates weaker companies and small- or micro-scale technologies that should be promoted and supported for the sake of lower costs and energy security What will happen to green

certificates?

Green certificates are going to be the main problem to solve in further work on the auction system. We could have a situation when two very different support systems would function concurrently. Demand for certificates would fall, while the administration will bear the costs of maintaining two systems.

-2-

H E SAID I T. . .

“The current system doesn’t work well in Poland, but the proposed system isn't going to work better. The lost time is impossible to make up for."

“The new rules could eliminate all technologies, except for 2-3 cheapest large-scale ones, which would take over the entire market after a few auctions. This would not help lower costs in the long run."

Grzegorz Wisniewski CEO o f I n s t i tut e o f R e n e wa b l e E n e rgy

CO P 1 9 ISS U E ( NO V ) INDICATORS Carbon price trends RES development EU-27 Unconventional gas stats Global emissions trends Global growth in solar, wind Global coal decomissioning EDITOR'S NOTE What would you like to see written about in the indicator's section of the next Cleantech (COP 19 Issue)?

Comments and suggestions to Wojciech@cleantechpoland.com (+48) 602 458 099

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 13

I nd I ca t o r s

-3-

1960 - 2012

H EAT AND P OWER BY T Y P E

GW INSTALLED, POLAND

38,045 GW TOTAL

40.000

The dynamic increase in installed nominal power, which occurred during the times of a centrally planned economy, did not continue after Poland’s political reform. Currently installed capacity meets demand, but in the near future this might not be the case. About 80% of nominal power is over 20 years old and over half has been depreciated for more than 30 years. When looking at Poland’s historical energy mix, the trend shows that the system favors coal based energy and some hydro-power. The recent attempt to diversify this mix led to gas playing a bigger role and the development of renewables.

2617 2221 2486 934 9635

20.000

20152

0 1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

2010

Hard coal power plants

Lignite-fired power plants

Gas-fired power plants

Country overall

Industrial power plants

Hydropower plants

Wind and other renewables

Heat power plants

Source: PSE

2012

P o w e r BY T Y P E

POLAND

2.8 % 5.6 % 1.7 % 2.5 %

35%

Despite the recent spike in installed renewable power, the final production from clean technologies remains small in comparison to Poland's annual consumption. Hydro power and wind energy generate most renewable power, while co-firing fills in the rest of the quota. The industrial energy part of the graph also represents mostly coal based power production. Because of the Directive 2010/75/EU on industrial emissions, up to 6.6 GW of old nominal power will be put offline. This gap will need to be filled with new installations. A shortage of nominal power of approximately 1.1 GW in 2017 is expected to be replaced by energy imports. Despite the negative prognosis, many investment initiatives are being put on hold due to legislative instability (especially in the RES sector and CO2 markets) and the low price of electricity.

53% Anthracite

Lignite

Hydro

Gas

Renewable

Industrial

Source: pse operator

2005 - 2012

Co -firing by numbers

TENS OF MILLIONS OF GREEN CERTIFICATES, POLAND

160 120 80 40 0 2005

2006

2007

2008

Cumulative total Source: polish power exchange

14 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

2009

2010

2011

Annual production

2012

Over time, co-firing on the one hand provided good statistics in terms of “green” energy production in Poland, on the other, it became the fruit of a perverse incentive to produce unsustainable quantities. The dynamic increase of issued green certificates to plants where biomass is burnt with coal shows how the market has been growing over time. With over 28 TWh of issued green certificates, the yearly quotas were either close to being met or recently even surpassed.

2010

I nd I ca t o r s

CO 2 EMISSIONS

poland

Carbon Emissions (without LULUCF)

2011

10.38 t CO2/capita

Kyoto Protocol Target

- 6%

Emissions Reductions by 2011

- 29%

Poland, % of EU emissions

8.8%

-4-

EMISSIONS BY RE G ION

Global emissions (EU)

11%

t CO2/capita in EU

7.5

Global emissions (US)

16 %

t CO2/capita in US

17.3

Global emissions (China)

29 %

t CO2/capita in China

7.1

Source: JRC

Source: KOBIZE, European Commission

1989- 2012

P OLAND ' S EMISSIONS V S Ta r g e t s

GHG CO2 Equivalent, MILLIONS

KP target

Poland’s emissions have fallen since 1988, when the country began its course towards a market economy. This was due to the close of inefficient, polluting plants, along with the collapse of heavy industry. The base year, negotiated by Poland’s representatives at the UNFCCC, gave the country an oversupply of Assigned Amount Units under the Kyoto Protocol. AAUs have been sold by Poland to countries struggling to meet their objectives, such as Japan, Spain and Ireland. A Green Investment Scheme was put in place, to so that proceeds go towards further GHG reduction.

600

300

0 1989

1999

2011

Source: kobize

P OLAND ' S CO 2 EMISSIONS 600

562.15

1989- 2012

GHG CO2 Equivalent, MILLIONS

445.66

399.39

300

0

1989

1992

1295

1998

2001

2004

2007

2010

From the look of it, Poland has done quite well in reducing their emissions; since 1989 an overall decline of about 25%. But upon close inspection, the story is more complicated. The baseline year set in the Kyoto Protocol (1988) meant that Poland's emissions reductions were achieved early on. It would be better to couple emissions reductions with GDP growth to see how Poland has done, as in the chart below.

Source: kobize

P OLAND ' S EMISSIONS V S G D P

POLAND 1989-2007

Upon a second look, Poland indeed has done quite qell. As GDP has increased, emissions have decreased, meaning, not all of the emissions reductions were due to economic collapse. Some occured during years of economic growth. However, one must bear in mind that the structure of the economy has changed, moving away from heavy industry toward light manufacturing and services.

200

125

50

1989

1992

1295

GDP index, 1988 = 100

1998

2001

2004

2007

CO2 emissions index , 1988 = 100

Source: eurostat, kobize

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 15

t r e nd i ng June 05/13 Poland’s slow nuclear progress

tobo/flicker

Poland cleared important regulatory hurdles that could pave the way for a nuclear reactor, according to a report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, Reuters reported. Hanna Trojanowska, Poland’s government commissioner for nuclear energy, said that “[the nuclear power plant] could be feasible in 10 to 12 years with a determined investor.,” in this case the state-controlled utility PGE. But PGE is under pressure, as the utility was tapped to fund the government’s shale gas program, and pushed to develop the Opole power plant, that PGE managers believe won’t be profitable.

These developments come during an economic slowdown and wholesale electricity trading at low prices.

Don’t let your nuclear hopes overheat

Recent events have also cast a shadow over the industry. Japan’s still fighting to contain radioactive water used to cool the Fukushima plant after a nuclear incident.

June 03/13

June 25/13

Number of countries using wind power passes the 100 mark

President Barack Obama presents US climate change action plan

@wwindea.org

@whitehouse.gov

June 06/13

UK: world’s largest offshore wind farm opens,

@kprm.gov.pl

@renewableenergyfocus.com

PM Tusk: government will help finance Opole power plant expansion

16 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

July 05/13

TREND I NG

July 11/13 July 24/13 PV capacity could grow Pressure on EIB to 8-fold until end of 2013 restrict coal lending The new lending strategy of the European Investment Bank (EIB), the EU’s finance institution, will limit financing of coal-fired energy projects, but environmental organizations call for a complete elimination of financing fossil fuels projects. The bank’s new energy policy will introduce Emission Performance Standards (EPS) for all fossil fuel generation projects to exclude emissions-intensive ones. The EPS level was set at 550 g CO2/kWh. Environmental organizations, like Bankwatch, a group monitoring the sustainability and environmental criteria of public lending in the EU, claim that the EIB’s new strategy could be better. “We need at least a 350 EPS level to say that the policy document is serious about addressing climate change,” said Bankwatch EIB coordinator Anna Roggenbuck.

emotion energy

A report from the Institute of Renewable Energy (IEO) estimates that 2013 could be a breakthrough year for photovoltaic energy in Poland, with several projects underway and the overall photovoltaic capacity reaching 24 MW at the end of 2013.

There are 3.6 MW of photovoltaic capacity installed in Poland today. Of this total 1.4 MW is connected to

the grid, whereas the remaining capacity serves producers, for example in households, according to the report.

Compared to 2011, the previous year saw a tiny growth of on-grid capacity totaling 38 kilowatts, while off-grid capacity grew by 200 kilowatts, the report says.

A predicted pick-up in the pace of development of the sector in the second half of 2013 could owe to falling wholesale prices of photovoltaic panels.

In 2012, the price of monocrystalline panels dropped 25 percent, while polycrystalline panels dropped 35 percent, compared to 2011. The price drop owes to imports from China.

July 25/13

Installed renewables capacity grew by 442 MW in H1 2013 to 4858 MW total

July 17/13

Report: Poland will not meet its 2020 renewable energy target @erec.org

@ure.gov.pl

bankwatch

From not too much to not much more

Built it, and they will shout

The EIB responds that over the last five years, its lending to fossil fuels-fired power generation projects declined to just 1.5 percent of overall energy lending.

July 31/13

Dutch, Italian, UK CCS projects stalled; Polish and German ones July 29/13 cancelled Czech Republic ends @endseurope.com subsidies for new renewables @endseurope.com

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 17

18 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Economic woes across Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) will translate into slight contraction of the wind market in 2013 and 2014, according to a study by Make Consulting.

The region is set to install 13.3 gigawatts of turbines this year and 12.4 gigawatts next year, down from 13.4 gigawatts in 2012.

What does Poland plan will be outcomes for COP19? Foremost, a concrete pathway to a global emissions reduction deal in 2015. The organizers also say emission reduction strategies from 2015 to 2020 will need explored.

Other goals include exploring a pilot phase of new market based mechanisms for emission reduction and clarifying financial commitments from 2013 to 2020 and post-2020. The organisers also want to end the summit with decisions on reducing emissions from forest degradation (REDD), land use and agriculture.

The Warsaw summit, which runs from November 11th to the 22nd, is seen as a critical milestone in efforts to develop a global climate change treaty. COP19 will start shortly after the release of the IPCC’s, the UN climate science body, latest report into the causes and

Nordex

September 9/13 Poland outlines ambitions for cop19

TREND I NG

August 21/13 EMEA wind market to shrink in 2013 and 2014

Several European governments decided to reduce support for renewable energy. Spain is no longer supporting new wind projects, the UK reduced subsidies, while emerging markets the Czech Republic and Romania have also revised their support schemes, citing the need to ensure cheap energy for end users.

Make Consulting predicts that the regional market will recover later in the decade, reaching 19 gigawatts of installations in 2020. Make Consulting forecasts that most onshore wind power in the region will reach gridparity by 2020, meaning it’s able to compete subsidyfree with traditional power generation.

tadeuszpro flickr

First we have to feed our children

Too bad it starts on November 11th

impacts of global warming. IPCC xperts are 95% sure that rising temperatures are man-made, and that sea levels may rise higher than previous estimates.

Aug 20/13

Aug 26/13

Japan Approves 19 GW of Commercial Solar in 2012 After Incentives

Norway Approves $3 Billion for Wind Power Plants to Triple Capacity

@renewableenergyworld.com

@renewableenergyworld.com

July 31/13

Aug 24/13

@renewableenergyfocus.com

@baltex-research.eu

EU and China agree solar panel price undertaking

The Baltic Sea emits more CO2 than it can absorb

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 19

t r e nd i ng September 13/13 CDP: Firms’ don’t disclose carbon impacts

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told representatives of energy, coal, and steel industries that Poland will retain coal and gas - specifically gas from

Companies in the global industrial, consumer goods and financial sectors are not disclosing the full carbon impact of their business activities, according to the Carbon Disclosure Project’s latest annual survey, ENDS Europe reported.

Most respondents disclosed CO2 from their own operations and as a result of the electricity they purchase – so-called scope 1 and 2 emissions.

But many of them did not report all scope 3 emissions from sources they have no direct control over, including suppliers and customers. According to CDP this “may mislead [investors] as to the full carbon impact of a company.” Firms tend to focus on emissions that are easier to measure, CDP also said.

KPRM

September 11/13 PM Tusk: Poland will bet on coal and shale

shales - as the most important energy sources for decades to come.

“We made a decision that renewable sources, which are necessary as a complementary energy source, will be limited as much as we possibly can in the EU. We want renewables, but key energy sources for us will be hard coal, lignite coal and - in the near future - shale gas,” Mr. Tusk said at an industry trade fair in Katowice.

Mr. Tusk also said that the government will direct financial resources to develop low-emissions technologies in energy and mining sectors.

Mr. Tusk spoke shortly before the government tabled a new auction-based system of support of energy from renewable sources (see p. 37). Poland is three years late in transposing the EU directive on renewables.

Aug 27/13

What’s carbon have to do with it?

CDP asked the world’s 500 largest listed companies to disclose their carbon footprint for 2013 and plans to cut emissions. Over 400 firms responded. Apple, Amazon and Facebook are among those that did not.

Sept 16/13

Green NGOs file for cancellation of environmental decision for Kulczyk’s Północ power plant

First Polish EUA auction takes place: 3.6 million EUAs sold

@clientearth.org

@reo.pl

Sept 4/13

Romanian cyanide-based goldmine set for 2016 operation @endseurope.com/ 20 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

NASA

We’ll do what they make us do

Sept 17/13

Poland tables new proposal for renewable energy support scheme @mg.gov.pl

The ministry of environment announced the in-kind donations of twelve companies who will provide products and services for the COP 19 conference.

Among the donating companies, there are Alstom Power (water, dispensers and cups for visitors), ArcelorMittal Poland (a temporary structure for the Na-

The Polish government presented the foundations of a new support system for energy from renewable sources and agricultural biogas. The new system (if it enters into force) will be that energy companies will take part in government-organized auctions during which they will compete on price per 1 MWh of energy produced from renewable sources or 1 cubic meter of agricultural gas.

Auction winners will receive permission to develop their projects and will be guaranteed sales of the energy they will produce at their proposed price for 15 years. The sales will be realized via a new government agency, with a proposed name of Renewable Energy Retail. The support will be directed at technologies that are “developed, stable and most cost-effective in terms of producing energy”.

The government also reiterated that Poland’s goal is

skyscrapercity

September 17/13 Poland tables new res’ support system

tional Stadium to host COP19 participants), BMW (60 fuel efficient cars for shuttling guests to the stadium). General Motors (10 automobiles and a chauffeur service), International Paper (10,000 reams of A4 and 30,000 reams of A3 paper). Also, Kaspersky Labs will provide anti-virus software to protect computer systems, PGE ecological notebooks and pens for visitors, and LOT access to lounge, a call center.

The president of the COP, environment minister Marcin Korolec, said that getting items donated is a routine practice used to handle the event’s logistics and offset its cost, totaling at PLN 100 million (€22

creative commons

Taking advantage of a cop-portunity

Spinning in circles

to achieve 19 percent of renewables’ share in total energy consumption by 2030. More on p. 37.

Sept 20/13

Russian authorities seize Greenpeace ship in the Arctic Sea, crew arrested

Sept 18/13

@greenpeace.org

County files lawsuit against government over open-cast lignite mine plans

TREND I NG

September 16/13 In-kind donations for COP19

Sept 20/13

Global warming ‘hiatus’ unlikely to last: draft U.N. report

Sept 20/13

@reuters.com

EU unveils forests strategy @europeanvoice.com

@reo.pl

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 21

.

22 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

policy

C L IMA T E P O L ICY

Coal is

expensive,

Wind is cheap

Why are coal miners paid a bigger pension than doctors? Because they are compensated for the adverse effects mining has on their health. The society has to pay for the respiratory and cardiovascular diseases caused by the release of sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide. All these added costs refute the “cheap coal” story that’s usually taken for granted. Think twice: it’s hard to sustain the argument that support for renewables is expensive.

Photogenica

By Tobiasz Adamczewski

For all the pleasant imagery that renewable energy invokes (a row of wind turbines in an idyllic rural landscape) the economics are widely believed to be in much worse shape.

Critics charge that renewables are a sector that’s perpetually on life support from subsidy schemes. The subsidies result from an overzealous EU political project that aims to reduce CO2 emissions from energy generation in order to abate climate change. In other words, support for renewables is politics meddling with markets.

Look at conventional energy, critics say, and there you find a square deal: no politics, no subsidies, only market rules - if you’re not competitive, you’re out of the game. Conventional fossil

fuels are reliable, as opposed to volatile wind and solar.

But take another look and you’ll see that things aren’t so simple: fossil fuel based energy generation also relies on subsidies. They too impose a high cost on taxpayers. Take a look again and you’ll find conventional fossil fuels may be more expensive and not less politicized than renewables.

YOU COST A LOT Coal-fired conventional energy may indeed appear cheap at a first glance, but the “cheap” argument doesn’t take into account the billions in varied forms of help that the coal sector has received in Poland over the last 15 years. Nor is there much recognition of the externalities imposed, like the 

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 23

health care needed in response to illnesses caused by air pollution.

Overall, thanks to various subsidy schemes, like long-term contracts or guaranteed free emissions allowances under the EU ETS (see table for details), the conventional energy sector will have benefited from close to PLN 500 billion (€125 billion) in subsidies and unaccounted health care costs between 1995 and 2020. Except for the health care cost, which is a relatively new way of looking at the cost of fossil fuel-fired energy production (at least in Poland), other gains of the conventional energy sector have long been public knowledge. So long, in fact, that the general public has stopped considering them as subsidies.

As for renewables, the Polish ministry of economy assesses the cost of the support mechanism to have been PLN 14 billion from 2005 to 2011. About 40 percent of that amount went to coalfired power plants through subsidies for co-firing coal with biomass, considered by some to be an illegitimate source of renewable energy that should be scrapped from a subsidy regime.

If the current system remains unchanged, the system will cost up to PLN 65 billion by 2020 and much of that 24 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Source: cleantech poland research, IEO, KOBiZE, Zarządca rozliczen, ministry of economy

Type

What’s it about?

Long Term Contracts

In order to secure financing of the investments of state-controlled energy utilities, the TSO paid a premium of 17% on 45-75% of energy sold. The final cost was relayed on end-users.

mid 1990’s to 2007

76 (18.1)

So-called stranded costs

Long Term Contracts were scrapped in 2007 and in 2008, a “substitute fee” was introduced, also paid by end-users in the form of so-called “stranded costs”

2008 to 2024

12.6 (3)

Green certificates for co-firing coal and biomass

Every MWh of this officially recognized renewable energy is rewarded with a tradeable certificate of origin

2005 to at least 2013

approx. 7.4 (1.8)

Derogations in the EU ETS

Derogations give the industry the ability to invest in its efficiency the amount they would have otherwise paid for emission allowances bought at auction from the treasury.

2013 to 2020

16.2 (3.8) in lost treasury revenue

Health loss and mortality rate

“The Unpaid Health Bill” report published by the Health and Environment Alliance in March 2013 calculated the outside costs, attributed to health problems, of burning coal in power plants.

1995 to 2012

380 (90.5)

Total:

When? PLN billion, (€)

492.2 (117.2)

How Poles have been, and will be, subsidizing the conventional power sector: out of pocket, with health and through budget’s lost revenue.

would still be going to co-firing installations in conventional power plants.

A law on renewable energy has been in the works in the government for the last three years and, if it enters into force anytime soon, it will establish a new subsidy system in which most of the support would go to renewables

like wind or solar. (Recently, a new proposal emerged from the government, however and there are concerns that the currently worked-on draft law will be trashed altogether, see p. 37). Whatever shape of the new regulatory regime is going to be, the government’s bottom line is that must not cost too much.

Photogenica

The money pit

Gąski (3000)

Bydgoszcz (238) WŁOCŁAWEK (460)

g i g a w at t s o n h o l d

Płock (450-600)

Coal-fired power plants Adamów (400)

Type

Warszawa (456)

Adamów (400) KOZIENICE (1075)

Puławy (840) Turów (460) ?

Wrocław (400)

Source: cleantech poland

Płock (450-600)

KOZIENICE (1075)

under way asTurów of July(460) 2013? 1000 Hard Coal Energa Ostrołęka (231) Lu Wrocław Location names in black(400) are planned Hard Coal PGE 1800investments Opole S Opole (1800) ? brackets denote capacity MW LigniteNumbers inPGE 450 in(850) Turow Blachownia Rybnik (1000) ?

S Hard Coal Tauron Kędzierzyn-Koźle 1000(200) Jaworzno Jaworzno (910) ? Łaziska (910) Hard Coal Tauron 1000 Rybnik Katowice (135) Hard Coal

(231) Lublin (1600)

Opole (1800) ?

Blachownia (850) Rybnik (1000) ?

Kędzierzyn-Koźle (200) Jaworzno (910) ? Łaziska (910) Katowice (135)

Polenergia 2000 Rajkowy Siersza (910) Locations shortlisted for nuclear power plant

Gas-fired power plants

Stara Wieś (800)

Coal-fired power power plantsplant Locations shortlisted for nuclear STALOWA WOLA (400)

Gas-fired power plants

Lignite-fired power plants Hard-coal firedLignite-fired power plantspower plants ? Projects on hold as of September 2013 (see table above) in red are investments Location namesLocation in red arenames investments under way as of July 2013 wayareasplanned of July 2013 Location namesunder in black investments Numbers in brackets denote capacity in MW Location names in black are planned investments

Siersza (910)

Numbers in brackets denote capacity in MW Locations shortlisted for nuclear power plant Hard-coal fired power plants

Gas-fired power plants

Lignite-fired power plants

Coal-fired energy may indeed appear cheap at a first glance, but the “cheap” argument doesn’t take into account the billions the coal sector has received

? Projects on hold as of September 2013 (see table above) ocation names in red are investments under way as of July 2013 ocation names in black are planned investments umbers in brackets denote capacity in MW

Aside from the support scheme, renewables in Poland have been granted over PLN 4 billion in EU funding from 2007 to 2013 and will continue to be supported through the new budgeting period of 2014 to 2020. Health costs, easily dismissed by the conventional power sector, are truly non-existent in the case of renewables.

NEW GIGAWATTS? Before long, the Polish energy sector will undergo a major overhaul. The bulk of the conventional energy generation installations built during the Communist-era will be soon obsolete.

The ministry of economy reports that by 2020 6.4 GW of installed coal-based power will be shut down because the power blocks won’t meet efficiency and pollution standards set by the Industrial Emissions Directive from 2011.

Close to 12 GW will have to be decom-

missioned by 2030. The pace of replacing these old installations with new ones will determine how problematic power shortages are going to be, and experts along with official government documents warn that the question is not “if ” but “when and how big”.

According to the ministry of economy, for example, 2017 will see a 1.1 GW power deficit. The ministry’s forecast assumes that planned coal-fired installations will be coming online as scheduled, but that has been put in question by real-life developments. Such key installations like PGE’s in Opole or Kulczyk Investment-owned Polenergia’s near Pelplin are on hold (see map and table above). Perversely (management says it won’t make money), the government has been pushing the majority state-owned PGE to develop Opole.

How then do the costs of conventional and renewable energy compare?

Wars

Lignite-fired power plants

Konin (120) Where?

Who? Nominal Power Location names in red are investments

Ostrołęka (1000) ?

WŁOCŁAWEK (460)

Konin (120)

policy

Gorzów (240)

Gas-fired power plants

Bydgoszcz (238) Gorzów (240)

O

Locations shortlisted for nuclear power plant

Grudziądz (500)

Pomorzany (244)

Grudziądz (500)

Pomorzany (244)

Żarnowiec (3000) Choczewo (3000) Gdańsk (500) Rajkowy (2000) ?

Gąski (3000)

Żarnowiec (3000) Choczewo (3000) Gdańsk (500) Rajkowy (2000) ?

A VIABLE ALTERNATIVE The levelized cost of energy (LCOE) tries to determine the cost of producing 1 MWh of energy throughout an installation’s lifecycle. The LCOE is often used as a comparative tool to show which technology can produce energy in the cheapest way.

There are different approaches to calculating the LCOE, and none are without controversy. Its hard to account for grid stability and geographical differences that need to be put into the calculation, while estimating fuel and emission prices 30 to 40 years into the future.

In 2012, Ernst & Young, a consultancy, calculated the LCOE (per 1 MWh) for different types of energy.

In Ernst & Young’s model, coal, gas and nuclear came out cheapest, with each technology’s cost per MWh at around PLN 300 (€70). Onshore wind came at PLN 466 (€110), offshore wind at PLN 713 (€169) and photovoltaics at PLN 1091 (€259).

The Ernst & Young model, like most LCOE models, didn’t factor in health costs of coal-fired energy generation.

This appears to have been an omission because these costs are significant and have a substantial influence on en- 

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 25

800 700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0

17,7 186,2

215,1 76,6 172,3 Coal

69,4

3,1 10,8

87,1

3,4

9,2 40,6

239,5

217,9

Advanced Coal

Wind

Levelized capital cost

599,5

Wind-Offshore

Fixed O&M

Variable O&M (including fuel and CO2 allowances) Transmission investment

Outside health costs

Assumptions: price of CO2 allowance = 15USD health cost of producing 1MWh of energy= 62 EUR Advanced Coal is 20% more efficient, so health costs also 20% smaller LCOE for coal fired plants from the EIA source was chosen as cheapest and Wind as average. Currency rate: 3.1 PLN/USD, currency rate: 1.3 USD/EUR.

SOURCE: EIA ANNUAL ENERGY OUTLOOK 2013, HEAL, CLEANTECH POLAND

Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE)

Only in the past decade have the renewables begun getting a fraction of the support coal has been receiving ergy price, according to a June 2013 report from the Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL).

If the current price of electricity in Poland, approximately 150 PLN/MWh (€35/MWh) were to be maintained throughout the projects’ lifecycle, none of the technologies could guarantee profit without subsidies. Secondly, externalities in the form of added health costs almost double the price per MWh for coal-based power generation, making renewable energy competitive even without major subsidies (see chart above).

New coal power, even if more efficient and less polluting, will not be clean enough to dismiss health costs and will still cost the average Pole at least twice as what’s printed on his energy bill. What has recently surfaced is that without further public support coal-fired projects might not even be viable.

26 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

One of the government’s ideas to push PGE to build the Opole power plant is to co-finance it via the National Fund for Environmental Protection and/or through guaranteed long term contracts with the Transmission System Operator.

Renewable energy (and gas to an extent) seem to be a viable alternative. As it is, however, the new law on renewable energy keeps being reinvented, and the quota system for highly efficient gas CHP remains a question mark.

Conventional power generation has been subsidized for many years. Only in the past decade has the renewable energy sector begun getting a fraction of the support coal has been receiving, yet there’s a disproportionate clamor about how costly renewables are.

When decisions about Poland’s energy mix have to be made, it’s important to at least level the playing field in a discussion about subsidies.

Poland’s messy energy policy One day it’s lignite, another day it’s shale gas, and still another day it’s renewables. Poland’s energy policy seems to be adrift. How long before it’s set on sustainability course?

Poland has binding emission reduction targets under the third phase of the EU-ETS, while both the government and the opposition say that climate policy is a threat to the economy. Poland has been habitually blocking the European Council conclusions on long-term climate policy goals.

Poland’s energy sector is entitled to derogation mechanism under which free emissions allowances will be granted to the sector until 2020. As backloading of the EUAs is on the cards in the EU, derogations could backfire because the EUAs market price would rise when most free allowances will be distributed and dent the budget’s revenue figures.

Poland offered to host the United Nations’ Climate Conference in Warsaw this year. At the same time, the Ministry of Economy is holding the “International Coal and Climate Summit”.

The renewable energy law has been floating around ministries for close to three years now, which never stopped the officials from talking opportunities that renewable energy holds. At the same time, the Prime Minister points to lignite coal as the future staple of Poland’s energy mix.

6 | CLEANTECH | Q1 2012

Ready to IN T ERVIEW

play ball

The renewable energy sector has been waiting a long time for an effective support regime. Conventional energy investments don’t make economic sense today. How do you make investment decisions in these uncertain economic and regulatory environments?

All renewable energy needs some form of government support or investors won’t meet their expectations of a return. There are regulations in place in Poland on which renewable energy companies might base their investment decisions. However, since it was announced that a new regulatory regime would be coming soon, development activity has stalled. It’s as if you were a footballer about to go out on a pitch but you still didn’t know what the rules of the game are going to be. Firms aren’t going forward with any investments because the capital at stake is just too big and you cannot afford making hasty and risky decisions. At Polenergia, we decided to get on with construction of two wind projects, Gajowice and Rajgród, but these are exceptions in our portfolio.

So building new renewable capacity is an exception.

Have you stopped developing projects as well?

No. We have about 1,000 MW of onshore wind projects and about 2,000 MW of offshore wind projects under development. Poland has a target to meet in 2020 in terms of renewables in 28 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Big energy projects aren’t the domain of state-run utilities only. Zbigniew Prokopowicz, board member of Poland’s biggest private energy investor, Polenergia, sits down with Cleantech to talk his investment strategy for the difficult times. i n t e r v i e w B y W o j c i e ch K o ś ć

the energy mix, so it only makes sense to develop projects and wait until the support system is decided, and then work on financing to get actual construction under way.

How can you even develop if there’s no way to be sure what

“

The announcement of new regulations coming soon has stalled development. It’s as if you were a footballer about to go out on a pitch but you still didn’t know the rules of the game”

kind of support will, say, offshore wind farms get?

Regulatory stability is going to come.

The question is whether it will come in time for Poland to meet its 2020 targets, which I doubt very much, to be honest.

Development isn’t so costly for us not to bear the risk and go ahead. But actual investment decisions, where billions are involved, are a different matter. They’re not going to happen until we know what foundations there are.

Of course, we can approximate certain factors, like the investment and operational costs going down in time, but still, we need concrete support solutions before we invest.

The EIB has recently published new investment strategy that will make it very difficult for coal-fired projects to obtain debt. Don’t problems with financing conventional energy generation owe partially to climate change policy that discourages emissions-intensive projects?

First of all, conventional energy projects suffer from the current poor economic conditions that hamper the

investment

for the entire energy system yet we cannot count on the government to help it get built.

terms of long-term contracts, and the challenge of predicting energy demand which determines a return on investment. If you cannot sign a long-term contract for energy supply, you’re not going to obtain debt financing for your project. The issue of emissions is different. Our Elektrownia Północ project is so much more efficient in comparison to old coal-fired power plants that I find it difficult to explain why the emissions argument is even brought up. Efficiency of most coal-fired power plants in Poland is around 35 percent, while it’s 45 percent in the case of Północ. I’m surprised that such projects are getting so much bad publicity. At the moment, it’s replacing old coal-fired capacity with modern installations that effectively reduces emissions.

What do you think is optimal energy mix for Poland?

Each country should build an energy mix based on resources available domestically so that energy isn’t too expensive and the environmental impact is acceptable. In Poland, hard coal, brown coal and wind should be the

“

Connect our grid to the German one and we’ll have access to as much energy as we need and when we need”

three basic sources of energy. The problem is that wind needs support and we don’t know what it’s going to be, while coal-fired installations don’t make business sense in the current conditions.

So, political decisions are needed to make sure there’s enough energy to meet demand, especially when old installations are set to shut down in the coming years. There’s no doubt that such decisions are necessary, but it’s not a fair game when the government first partially privatizes PGE and then tells private investors to get involved in a project [Elektrownia Opole] that won’t make financial sense. Polenergia’s project, Elektrownia Północ, is important

So you think the government is right to stick to coal as the staple of Poland’s future energy mix?

I don’t necessarily claim that coal-fired capacity should grow, but it definitely has to be replaced with modern installations, or we’ll face blackouts, of which the government is very well aware.

I think that coal-fired capacity should be at a constant of 25-28 gigawatts, while growth in energy consumption should be covered by renewables. Balancing supply and demand, when, for example, renewables underperform, should be handled by investing in getting our grid connected to grids of other countries. Connect our grid to the German one and we’ll have access to as much energy as we need and when we need.

Do you agree with the Polish government’s position on the EU’s climate action policy: let the big emitters do something for climate before we commit to radical emissions cuts ourselves?

It doesn’t matter how much emissions Europe is responsible for. What matters is how much the world is emitting.

Emissions must be reduced in globally coordinated action. Denmark can cut its emissions 20 percent but what kind of effect it will have globally with emitters like China?

Well yes, but there has to be a global leader in fighting climate change that others will follow.

I agree, provided that others will indeed follow. At the moment, they’re not.

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 29

Low Carbon energy efficiency

A growing number of smart business leaders are making the right choice.

Companies from Carlsberg to Tesco are investing big into in energy efficiency.

What follows is a story of the low carbon leaders who are moving Poland in a sustainable direction.

This feature was produced in association with Global Call for Climate Action, a US-based environmental advocacy organization.

LEGIA CLUB – Thanks to new lighting, the fans of Legia Warsaw can enjoy the football match after the sun goes down, while the club pays less to keep the lights on. The 2010 renovation of the Pepsi Arena is a good example of a smart investment in energy efficiency that will pay dividends to its owner.

Because lighting is such a huge component of energy use in a stadium, the construction contractor Qumak Sekom chose to optimize the stadium lighting with the use of Schneider Electric systems and controls. The installed lighting system consists of 1000 modules with a total capacity of 1 MW. According to Jacek Łukaszewski, president of Schneider Electric Polska, the investor was looking for a solution that would help to reduce energy costs.

“For such a large and prestigious investment, we wanted to choose a reli30 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

photogenica

By Piotr Wdowiński, Pa r k e r S nyd e r

able system that met the expectations of its users. The technical capabilities were important, but so was their ability to integrated with several independent producers. We think we chose the best solutions for this type of project,” Mr. Łukaszewski said.

In addition to advanced lighting, Schneider Electric optimized the heating and cooling systems.

Monitoring equipment allows the operator to control power use in the building. For instance, network analyzers were used in the PM series Schneider Electric Modbus.

Schneider Electric marketing manager Anna Szymczyk said Schneider Electric was honored to be part of the design team that improved the energy efficiency of the Legia Stadium. They’ve incorporated their success into their promotional literature, using their success with one project to further grow their revenue share in markets connected with sustainable development.

The new stadium, which can accommodate up to 33,000 fans has a total area of some 113,695 square meters.

The stadium is a member of the UEFA “elite” category.

efficiency

Leaders

Legia Warszawa Pepsi Arena, czyli stadion warszawskiej Legii przeszedł kompleksową modernizację oświetlenia w 2010 roku. Właściciel klubu wskazał oświetlenie jako element wyposażenia stadionu, który jednocześnie decyduje o komforcie piłkarzy i widzów przy meczach rozgrywanych wieczorem oraz generuje znaczące koszty. Modernizację przeprowadziła firma Qumak Sekom, która do realizacji projektu wybrała rozwiązania oferowane przez Schneider Electric. Oprócz modernizacji oświetlenia stadionu o pojemności 33 000 widzów i całkowitej powierzchni ponad 110 tysięcy metrów kwadratowych, Schneider Electric zmodernizował również system ogrzewania i chłodzenia.

Source: Legia warsaw, schneider electric

pepsi arena Location

Warsaw, Poland

Investment Type

Sports stadium

Date Completed

2010

Investor

Legia Warsaw

Total size

113,695 sqm

HVAC

TAC Vista

Access controls

I/Net

Lighting controls

Schneider Electric

Contractor

Qumak - Sekom S.A.

Investment volume

PLN 400 million (€95 million)

Project specifics - The HVAC system had 15,000 points,

the access system controls 150 doors and the lighting system approximately 2000 points. The control systems had to interoperate with a number of independent equipment manufacturers.

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 31

GILLETTE FACTORY – You probably know the consumer goods company Procter and Gamble. For sure you recognize one of their global brands - Pampers, Duracell or Gillette.

Gillette, a shaving supplier, has one of their largest manufacturing facilities in the world based in Łódź, Poland which produces razors for the Central European, African and Asian markets.

In August 2010, the factory was modernized to improve energy efficiency.

Thanks to capital investment that favored energy saving technologies, P&G lowered energy consumption and improved overall plant efficiency.

Prior to selecting the infrastructure upgrades, Trane, an indoor solutions provider, and Gillette used Trace 700, Trane’s energy modeling software to weigh the merits of potential solutions with a lifecycle analysis model. Based on the results, Gillette chose solutions that would best fit their needs.

Efficiency improvements included variable flow dryers and so-called dry coolers. Upgrades also included the extension of a free-cooling function, which enables ambient cold to be used for cooling, limiting the need for the compressor mode.

Stefan Wysocki, the technical direc32 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Source: gillette

gillette

G I L L E T T E FAC TO R Y Location

Łódź, Poland

Investment Type

Factory

Date Completed

August 2010 (renovation)

Investor

Procter & Gamble

Total size

82,721 sqm

HVAC

Trane

Investment volume

Undisclosed

Project specifics - The factory was modernized through the use of Trane

700 energy modeling software, an energy efficiency improvement that replaced the facility’s chilled water plant management system and controls.

tor of the Łódź factory, says that P&G plans its investments according to the principles of sustainable development.

“We are constantly looking for ways to increase energy efficiency. Combining environmental concerns with improved performance of our company, we can develop in a sustainable way,” Mr. Wysocki said.

According to Gillette’s model, the factory’ return on investment in the modernization process should be reached in just over two years. For its efforts, the Gillette factory in Łódź is one of a few facilities worldwide that received an “Energy Efficiency Leader” award, given out by Trane. P&G has used the award to promote their project internally and as a showcase of their CSR

commitment. Globally, since 2002, the company has reduced energy consumption in factories by 50 percent.

Gillette Dzięki modernizacji znacząco obniżono zużycie energii w fabryce przy jednoczesnym zwiększeniu jej wydajności. Zastosowano też inne rozwiązania podnoszące wydajność, w tym wdrożenie zmiennych przepływów wody lodowej oraz chłodnic wentylatorowych w celu uzyskania optymalnych wyników działania. Zgodnie z założeniami zwrot z inwestycji nastąpił w ciągu zaledwie dwóch lat od zakończenia prac.

photogenica

efficiency

Carlsberg Poland

Source: carlsberg poland

KASZTELAN BREWERY Location

Sierpc, Poland

Investment Type

Factory

Date Completed

2013 (planned)

Investor

Carlsberg Poland

Total size

2.6 million hectoliters of beer annually

Investment volume

Undisclosed

Project specifics - The production line will be expanded to run ten fermenting tanks; advanced solutions such as heat recovery systems, which use heat from flue gas.

CARLSBERG POLAND – Kasztelan, promoted as the “perfect beer for a barbecue,” is undergoing an investment to expand production and cut on energy use in 2013.

Carlsberg Poland - owner of the Kasztelan brewery - hopes increased production will serve their customers with a better beer in larger volumes.

But historically, Carlsberg Poland also knows the value of investing in energy efficiency when making capital improvements.

From 1990 - 2008, Carlsberg expanded beer production four times, while increasing energy consumption only thirty percent, according to Adam Pawelas, an environmental manager.

During this time, the Kasztelan brew-

ery was modernized by replacing outdated heat-generating equipment. The coal-fired boiler was re-designed to run on natural gas, which helped to reduce the plant’s emissions by 40 percent.

In 2013, this most recent investment will add ten fermenting tanks to the Kasztelan brewery capable of producing 2.6 million hectoliters of beer annually. (The current production is around 4 million hectoliters). A smart technical design will increase the energy efficiency of the Kasztelan brewery by 20 percent. The additional cost of the investment, which Mr. Pawelas estimates at no more than 5 percent of total CAPEX, should be returned to the plant’s owner within 3 years.

Elsewhere, Carlsberg upgraded a

Inwestycja zaplanowana na 2013 rok będzie polegać na dodaniu do browaru Kasztelan dziesięciu zbiorników fermentacji, w których można rocznie wyprodukować 2,6 milionów hektolitrów piwa (bieżąca produkcja wynosi około 4 milionów hektolitrów). Inteligentne rozwiązania techniczne pomogą zwiększyć efektywność energetyczną browaru Kasztelan o 20 procent. Koszt inwestycji, powinien się zwrócić zakładowi w ciągu 3 lat.

wastewater treatment plant at the Okocim brewery, and installed an integrated heat recovery system in the Bosman brewery. The waste heat from flue gases was recovered to preheat boiler feed water, a process that can improve boiler efficiency from 3 to 7 percent. Equipment, controls and maintenance, Mr. Pawelas says, are three parts of an energy efficiency plan.

Historically, beer production was an energy intensive process. Today, brewers are optimizing it in a way that saves energy and increases profits. Part of the challenge in maintaining the energy efficiency of a brewery lies in leaking from steam traps, valves and pipes.

That’s why maintenance is prominent in Carlsberg’s efficiency plan.

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 33

34 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

panels absorb noise well and provides excellent fire, safety and thermal insulation.

According to the supplier Ruukki, they’re a good choice if you need a facade with a high requirement for energy efficiency, fire resistance, improved strength and a good appearance. Sealing the building also improves indoor air quality and energy efficiency.

In what is becoming now a standard practice for the majority of new commercial developments in Poland, TriGranit will have Poznań City Center BREEAM-certified.

PKP/TriGranit Projekt Poznań City Center to efekt współpracy Polskich Kolei Państwowych i węgierskiego dewelopera TriGranit. Na atrakcyjnie położonej działce w centrum Poznania, tuż obok Międzynarodowych Targów Poznańskich, TriGranit zbudował nowe centrum komunikacji szynowej i autobusowej, zintegrowanej z powierzchniami biurowymi i handlowymi. Cały kompleks będzie certyfikowany w standardzie BREEAM.

Poz n ań C ity C e n te r

Source: PKP, trigranit

POZNAŃ CITY CENTER – The principles of sustainable construction have been used in the implementation of a modern constrution works in the central Poznań railway station.

Polish State Railways (PKP) and Hungarian real estate developer TriGranit Development entered into agreement in 2009, according to which the developer would carry out a complete redesign of the railway station in return for an opportunity to develop office and retail complex integrated into station.

The €160 million investment, to be completed this year, will give Poznań - Poland’s major business hub - a new railway station, city tram stop, office buildings, parking lots, hotel and shopping mall. Both the railway station component and the commercial office/ retail component are being built to high energy efficiency and sustainability standards.

One of the high-performance materials selected were insulating and acoustic panels supplied by the Finnish company Ruukki. With a non-combustible structural mineral wool core, these

Location

Poznań, Poland

Investment Type

Mixed use: commercial and transit

Date Completed

Public transit part 2012/commercial part 2013

Investor

Polish State Railways/TriGranit

Investment volume

€160 million

Project specifics - BREEAM-certified integrated city transport hub/office and retail center, Ruukki panels providing thermal insulation and noise protection.

efficiency

Source: mars poland

M A RS F A C T O R Y i n J a n a s z ó wek Location

Janaszówek, Poland

Investment Type

Industrial Factory

Date Completed

2012

Investor

Mars Inc.

Investment volume

Undisclosed

mars poland

Project specifics - Nearly 25% of water gets recycled within the plant so it

can be be put to use again. The Mars factory landfills no waste. The byproducts get utilized in biogas, and less packaging required.

MARS CHOCOLATE FACTORY – Next time you bite into a Snickers bar, think of the hard work of the engineers, who improved the energy efficiency of the Janaszówek chocolate factory in 2012.

Responding to the Mars Inc. wide challenge to reduce energy consumption and decrease water intensity, the Janaszówek design team optimized snack production by modeling energy usage and choosing equipment that does the job but isn’t too expensive.

After the renovation, total energy consumption fell 14 percent. Energy efficient lighting helped the plant to decrease electricity use by 23 percent.

Nearly 25 percent of water gets recycled within the plant so it can be put to use again. According to the corporate affairs director Jarosław Kutelski, Mars Poland would like to be water and energy self sufficient by 2040. Today, the factory landfills no waste. By-products of the production process, like seed shells, get utilized in a biogas plant.

Mars Polska Zakład w Janaszówku zoptymalizował produkcję modelując zużycie energii i wybierając wyposażenie, które pozwala na realizację takiego celu, ale nie jest zbyt drogie. Po renowacji zużycie energii zmniejszyło się o 14%.

Energooszczędne oświetlenie pomogło zakładowi obniżyć zużycie prądu o dalsze 23%, a 25% wody podlega recyklingowi.

Source: national library

Natio n al L ib r a r y Location

Warsaw, Poland

Investment Type

Public Building

Date Completed

2013

Investor

Polish Government, Japanese Government

Investment volume

PLN 26 million (€6.2 million)

Project specifics - The building dates from the 1960s, and many of the mechanical

systems have never been replaced. 6,000 square meters of windows and 1,000 new radiators, were replaced over the summer when traffic is less.

NATIONAL LIBRARY – The National Library in Warsaw holds the literary treasures of the nation, but until recently, these cultural gems were kept in an old building that cost a lot to heat and cool.

Until 2013, when the Polish government renovated the National Library over a period of ten months to improve its energy efficiency. The total cost of the renovation was PLN 26 million (€6.2 million). More than PLN 20 mil-

lion (€4.78 million) was financed by Green Investment Scheme (GIS), a government program to modernize buildings and infrastructure.

According to the library authorities, after the modernization, the building will use 67% less heat and its CO2 emissions will drop by 50%. This means that annual CO2 emissions will decline by 2,300 tonnes per year. GIS, since its inception, has reduced emissions by 300,000 tonnes per year.

Biblioteka Narodowa Przedsięwzięcie zrealizowano w ramach projektu „Zarządzanie energią w budynkach Biblioteki Narodowej” ze środków Krajowego Systemu Zielonych Inwestycji (GIS). W ramach GIS umowę zawarli ministerstwo środowiska i działająca z ramienia japońskiego ministerstwa gospodarki organizacja NEDO. Dofinansowanie wyniosło 20,7 mln zł.

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 35

FITs, SUBSIDY REGIME

for real

Investors paying close attention to changing renewable energy support systems in Poland may have heard the news that a feed-in-tariff (FIT) is in the works. If passed by the Polish parliament, a new support scheme for renewable electricity, not heat, could become law as soon as Q1 of 2014.

B y p a r k er s n yder

On September 17th, 2013, the ministry of economy released a new proposal that did away with earlier attempts to reform the Polish renewable energy regulations. Primarily based on feed-in-tariffs obtained at auction, this proposal seems to favor wind, biogas and biomass, while turning away from more expensive types (solar) and more controversial forms (co-firing).

Mention of an auction based FIT system came as a surprise to analysts, considering an earlier draft law that seemed to favor keeping the current support system based on so-called “certificates of origin.” The 2012 draft law had planned to move away from the current system which awards 1 certificate for each MWh of renewable en36 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

ergy produced, regardless of the type of technology, toward a certificate system which tried to “level the playing field” for more expensive types. Certain “correction coefficients” were to be granted based on a ratio of CAPEX to OPEX. This system would have made solar PV much more economically attractive.

PROPOSED, TODAY The draft law, whose details were made public on September 17th, is essentially a FIT system such as the one the Dutch have put in place. The FIT will go to auction, and the winner of the auction who submits the lowest eligible bid will receive a 15 year price guarantee. The government will be obliged by law to accept the least expensive bid.

creative commons

this time

To ensure that the bid is not too high, FITs will be capped at a reference price compared to a ratio of CAPEX/OPEX. To ensure that the bid isn’t too low, a bidder cannot submit a bid less than 70 percent of the reference price. One quarter of the annual support will go only to projects of less than 1MW, in theory allowing smaller, distributed power generation to compete with large utility scale generation.

This proposed FIT system, in contrast to the government’s earlier proposal, returns to the idea of favoring cheaper, stable forms of renewable energy. Still, correction coefficients will be retained - for biomass, biogas and small scale hydro will receive a correction coefficient of 1.15. Large, existing hydropower plants will be exempt from

business Is the sun rising or setting on the renewable energy sector in Poland? The new auctionbased support system will favor stable, proven sources of energy, the government says. Critics charge that auctions will lead to a few cheap, large-scale technologies to monopolize the market

this system. Co-firing (biomass alongside coal) will receive a correction coefficient of 0.50. That means 1 certificate for every 2 MWh of power, with total co-firing support per annum capped at 6.5 TWh. WHY CHANGE AT ALL? Over the last 12 months, green certificates, trading as high as 220 PLN (€52)/

MWh were trading at a low of 100 PLN (€23)/MWh, and subject to wild price swings. Falling green certificate prices have caused equity and debt investors to pull back on financing, as ROIs are hard to predict.

Some analysts said the cause of the falling green certificate prices was an oversupply due to cheap renewable energy from co-firing biomass with coal.

This proposed FIT system, in contrast to the government’s earlier proposal, returns to the idea of favoring cheaper, stable forms of renewable energy

Low certificate prices, coupled with uncertainties about a future support system, caused NPVs to go negative.

Operational wind projects that were once divested at upward of €2.1 mln/ MWh were recently fetching less than €1.8 mln/MWh. At the same time, the government feared that a new support system could be too generous to certain technologies that are getting cheaper with time.

The Polish government wanted to avoid the mistakes of Germany or Czech Republic.

The proposed new support system, while not as attractive for solar, could do a lot to boost agricultural biogas.

Wind investors too may return enthusiastically to a market that is nowhere near saturation.

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 37

Warsaw stock exchange

Companies are leaving, regulations are late.

Investing in renewable energy companies has never seemed so unattractive - contrary to what analysts see as strong fundamentals for growth in the sector until at least 2020.

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

INVESTMENT

Not a write-down yet Writing off renewable energy as a sector least attractive for investment has been very easy in the last 12 months. But if investors are considering renewables a thing of the past in terms of investment, they better think again.

The government’s attempts to establish a new subsidy scheme have been lacking determination and were typically less than well-thought in terms of details (for the subsidies saga, see next page). Discouraged, companies like DONG or Iberdrola have left. There seemed to be little potential in the renewable market for investors, as well as companies considering IPOs on the Warsaw Stock Exchange (WSE), considered the strongest stock exchange in central and eastern Europe.

But according to Jarosław Dąbrowski, CEO of Dąbrowski Finance, a financial services company, while the uncertainty about regulatory framework for renewable energy is causing investors

to look at the sector with skepticism, they’re not going to give up.

“I don’t expect the capital to turn away from renewable energy assets.

Most investors will assess their returns fairly correctly, based on detailed analysis of what they’re investing in. Solving the issue of regulatory risk is however weighing upon any company looking for investors,” Mr. Dąbrowski said.

“If there have been companies who fared poorly on the stock exchange, I’d put it down to their weakness rather than to any fundamental weakness of the sector as a whole,” Mr. Dąbrowski said. Valuations of the companies from the WSE’s WIG-Energy index, where many firms are engaged in renewables, are not dramatically off the mark, he adds.

Krzysztof Młynarz, chief financial officer at Environmental Investment Partners, an investment company, says that there’s no shortage of investors’ money in Poland looking for renewable

“If the current policy doesn’t change, there are at least seven years of growth ahead of renewables in Europe” Jarosław Dąbrowski, Dąbrowski Finance 38 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

energy assets.

“Who says that these investors have to invest in companies operating only in Poland? That Poland doesn’t have proper regulations doesn’t mean that the renewable energy sector isn’t attracting capital from investors based here. If they don’t find anything in Poland, they look to other markets,” Mr. Młynarz said.

He also suggests that Polish renewable energy companies should consider expansion of their operations outside Poland so that reduce the risk from being tied to one sluggish market.

On the other hand, international companies should trade on the WSE, CEE’s premiere location to go for capital. For example, Global Energy, a company trading renewable energy and developing wind and solar projects in Europe that just pleased investors with posting PLN 2.3 million (€540,000) profit for the second quarter of 2013.

Mr. Dąbrowski says that as long as the EU policy will be to reduce emissions and support renewable energy so as to achieve 20 percent of renewables share in energy consumption in 2020 across the bloc, the sector will remain attractive.

“If the policy doesn’t change, there are at least seven years of growth ahead of renewables in Europe,” he said.

a d v e r t o r i al

Prime headline rents have decreased because of increasing supply of office space combined with a high level of development on the Warsaw office market; also landlords recognise that it is an ‘occupier’s market’ with the need to offer competitive terms to tenants.

Brian Burges s, Savills

picture: savills

Of new supply in 2013, about 65% of new floorspace is within buildings that will obtain some sort of ‘green’ certification.

Proportion of green certified new buildings in Warsaw rising: Savills

N

ow is a good time for tenants to renegotiate current leases as they can expect lower rents and attractive packages of incentives offered by their existing landlord or relocate to buildings under development.

Thanks to approximately 152,500 sq m of new supply in the first half of 2013, the total office stock in Warsaw exceeded 4 million square meters. Out of nine office buildings completed during the first half of the year, only one is located in the city center (Plac Bankowy 1; 3,700 sqm) whereas four totaling 107,600 sqm are located in Upper South (Mokotów) where the total stock is now over 1.1 million sqm (28% of Warsaw’s total). A further 150,000 sqm of new supply is expected to be delivered in H2 2013. Of new supply in 2013, about 65% of new floorspace is within buildings that will obtain some sort of ‘green’ certification.

Next year’s supply is expected to be at a record high level of 313,000 sqm with the largest developments located in the South West (Eurocentrum by Capital Park; 40,000 sq m) and North (Gdański Business Center I by HB Reavis; 29,700 sq m). In contrast to this year, in

2014 almost 32% of new supply will be located in the City Centre with the first building of Warsaw Spire by Ghelamco (20,000 sq m), Atrium I by Skanska (16,300 sq m) and Plac Małachowskiego

by Kulczyk Silverstein (16,500 sq m). The proportion of “green” certified new buildings will rise to 73% in 2014.

TENANTS’ MARKET Brian Burgess, Managing Director at Savills Poland, says: “We are seeing a strong level of activity on Warsaw’s office market and expect that by year-end total gross take-up will reach 600,000 sq m, almost in line with the 2012. Warsaw remains a favoured destination for domestic and international tenants.

With better deals from existing landlords, many tenants remain where they are, although developers of new buildings are competing strongly for tenants to relocate by offering lower headline rents and fuller concessions. Also the

proportion of office buildings with a ‘green’ certification sold is increasing with over 50% by volume in 2013 to date, in comparison to less than 10% for the whole of 2012.”

Prime headline rents currently range between €22-€23 per sq m/month in the City Centre and €14-€14.75 per sq m/month in the non-central Mokotow district, representing a 5% decline over the last 12 months. Savills expects these to remain stable going forward, albeit that concessions to tenants will continue to be extensive.

Currently, the average Warsaw vacancy rate is at 10.5%, up from 7.4% year-on-year. The average vacancy in non-central zones is at 10.8% (up from 7% YOY). With 1.1m sqm of new office stock due by the end of 2015 the average vacancy rate is expected to rise to 11% by end 2013 and 12% in 2014.

“The proportion of ‘green’ certified new buildings will rise to 73% in 2014”

Brian Burgess, Savills

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 39

creative commons

Poland is finding itself in hot water over a Finnish NGO’s allegations that a mammoth toxic waste pile could be leaking phosphates into the Baltic Sea. B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

It looks like a natural wonder from afar. Up close, however, the rectangular-shaped hill in Wiślinka near Gdańsk is in fact a 50-meter high, 16-million tonne pile of phosphogypsum, a by product of fertilizer production. This waste pile is also a recent source of international trouble for Poland.

The pile is an unwanted legacy of a local phosphate fertilizer production plant that was operational between 1972 and 2009. In June 2013, The Finnish John Nurminen Foundation, an NGO working to improve the condition of the Baltic Sea, said that a report it commissioned from Finnish company Pöyry, indicated that there was a “significant risk” of phosphates’ leaking from the pile and polluting the Baltic Sea and the nearby Martwa Wisła River.

SENSITIVE WATERS According to the Pöyry report, the pile could discharge about 200 tonnes of phosphorus annually. It’s a problem for the Baltic Sea, which is a shallow and isolated marine environment sensitive to pollution. The Helsinki Commission (HELCOM), an international organization working to monitor and prevent further deterioration of the Baltic Sea, says that phosphorus pollution is particularly dangerous for the area.

Marjukka Porvari, Director of the Clean Sea Project at the John Nurminen Foundation, says the Wiślinka waste pile fares rather poorly in terms of isolation from groundwater. “[In Wiślinka] the basic insulation measure used in these kind of stacks, the so called hydraulic insulation 40 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

M A R I N E P R O T E C T I ON

Waste

Water

into

keeping the level of leachate water in collecting ditches inside the pile below the surface water level - has not been implemented. Moreover, there is no vertical or bottom insulation of the pile,” Mr. Porvari said.

Phosphorus pollution causes eutrophication, or the process of the sea water becoming too “fertile” leading to excess growth of algae, for example, which in turn leads to oxygen depletion and reduces marine biodiversity.

The countries which surround the Baltic have diverse economies, and relative to Poland, Finland is a lot wealthier, turning many environmental issues into international political bat-

Phosphorus pollution causes eutrophication, which in turn leads to oxygen depletion and reduces marine biodiversity

tles. It’s unsurprising then that following the alarm raised by the Finnish NGO, the Polish government begun probing the pile to find out if the phosphogypsum is leeching into the groundwater.

There exists, albeit remote, possibility of the EU imposing penalties on Poland for polluting the Baltic Sea, but according to Mr. Porvari, polluting companies are likely to take action in the first place or they will face negative publicity that could harm their plans to raise investment capital.

The initial results of the probe confirmed that the Wiślinka waste site has indeed caused phosphorus levels to exceed norms in the nearby Martwa Wisła River. “The survey indicated significant growth of phosphates concentration in Martwa Wisła in the zone directly adjacent the landfill,” the Polish ministry of environment said in a written statement.

According to Mr. Porvari, the most recent wave of interest in potential sources of phosphorus pollution in the Baltic Sea area was spurred by last year’s discovery of a massive phosphorus leak of 1,700 tonnes annually, from a waste pile in Kingisepp, Russia. The Russian leakage was directed into treatment eventually.

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Not giving up P V D E V E L OP M E N T

A year ago, the market looked to have been on the verge of a PV boom. While there’s not much left of that enthusiasm, there are companies pushing forward with no small projects.

Amidst the bleak news of regulatory support for photovoltaic installations being pushed back to an unknown date in the future, there are companies that still believe the good times are coming.

AMB Energia is one such company.

Buckling the overall trend of renewable energy firms going into stand-by or even closing up shop in Poland, the company’s CEO Przemysław Pięta is moving on with Poland’s biggest PV project to date.

When completed, Podlasie Solar Park will be a complex of three PV installations in the vicinity of the north eastern Polish towns of Kolno, Lipsk and Jedwabne. Covering a total area of eight hectares, the project will have a capacity of 4 megawatts. The development is carried out in stages, the first stage will be completed in 2013 while the stages 2 and 3 will go online by early 2014, according to Mr. Pięta.

The project is going forward in ad-

istockphoto

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

verse conditions for renewable energy in Poland and Mr. Pięta admits that, first of all, if not for the EU funding - to the tune of PLN 13.9 million (€3.3 million) - the project would never be profitable.

NEED SUPPORT “With the current level of support for producers of energy from renewables, project like ours wouldn’t be possible to carry out without extra support.

Even with the support in place, Podlasie Solar Park is only going to achieve a relatively small return on investment,” Mr. Pięta said.

Why bother then? Mr. Pięta still thinks that the overhaul of the support

The CEO of AMB Energia hopes that the overhaul of the support of renewables is on the cards in the government and will be reality sooner than later 42 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

of renewables is on the cards in the government and will be reality sooner than later. Once that happens, his company will have the advantage of experience over competitors plus be right at the foot of the fast-growth curve of solar PV capacity in Poland.

“We want to show that PV in Poland makes sense and has potential. On completion, we will have a valuable experience. Of course, it would be easier to know now what the renewables law will be like,” Mr. Pięta said.

The CEO’s own vision of a perfect support system for PV in Poland isn’t all that different from what his peers in the sector keep saying.

“Cut red tape for micro installations and simplify the regulations on construction, land planning and environment. On the other hand, the support should foster writing credible business plans with a desired IRR and reduce volatility of green certificates’ pricing,” Mr. Pięta said.

This vision, however, is still being ground on by bureaucrats in Warsaw, to no certain outcome.

E N V I R O N M E N TA L L E A D E R S H I P

It’s not a man’s world. It’s a world where the unique strengths of men and women work together to solve our biggest environmental challenges. In Poland, female professionals have in many ways been responsible for the green in green building. As early advocates, impassioned educators and trained architects, females have been behind the helm of a trend that will see nearly three quarters of next year’s Warsaw new office market certified to a green building standard. To recognize these ladies’ achievements, Cleantech hosted sixteen professionals over two days at the Hotel Le Regina in the style of Vanity Fair.

TEXT BY WOJCIECH KOŚĆ P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y B E ATA J A R Z Ę B S K A CLOTHING BY BIZUU S H O T O N L O C AT I O N AT M A M A I S O N H O T E L L E R E G I N A WA R S AW S T Y L I N G B Y K ATA R Z Y N A Ł A S Z C Z hair & makeup by A N E T A K A c P R Z A K W I T H T H A N K S TO O U R PA R T I C I PA N T S

44 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

People

F E AT U R I N G : A gata W r ó bel ( P olnord ) A gnieszka K ozłowska - K orbicz ( M inistry of E nvironment ) A neta W ięcka ( I nstitute of R enewable E nergy ) A nna C zy ż ( H ays P oland ) D evin S aylor ( S kanska ) E wa R utkowska - S ubocz ( D entons ) I sabelle C lerc ( A E W E urope ) J oanna S chulders ( U B M P olska ) J oanna W is - B ielewicz ( T U P ) K atarzyna Z awodna ( S kanska ) K inga A nasiewicz - Z aręba ( V estas ) K inga N owakowska ( C apital P ark ) M agdalena S tretton ( A rcadis ) R egina G ul ( J ones L ang L a S alle ) R enata K usznierska ( D T Z ) S vetlana R obinson ( F uture 4 B uild )

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 45

Anyone with an interest in sustainability should have dropped by the Warsaw Le Regina Hotel on two occasions this summer, when sixteen leading female professionals in construction, real estate and renewable energy were taking part in Cleantech’s cover project.

But it wasn’t about the cover. It was about honoring these ladies for their professional achievements. For two days, Le Regina Hotel hosted an elite group of women whose business expertise and environmental awareness has made them leaders in their sector.

These including the leading female professionals in sustainable development, environmental consulting, wind power, real estate and environmental law.

These women are astute business leaders who know how to succeed and fierce stewards of natural resources, true environmentalists. Their achievement demonstrates that environmentalism has become a thread in the fabric of our lives that can’t be dis-entwined. This, of course, wasn’t always the case.

FOUR YEARS, AN EPOCH Ewa Rutkowska-Subocz, head of the environmental protection and natural resources practice in the Warsaw office of Dentons, a law firm, spent a year in Belgium as a student. “This was before Poland joined the European Union.

Back then, environmental law wasn’t even a common practice in Western Europe, let alone Poland. No one was interested in legal environmental issues, nor did they consider them important,” Ms. Rutkowska-Subocz said.

Today, she says, environmental legal issues show up in a number of otherwise non-environment related legal cases: for example managing risk when a transaction concerns contaminated 46 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

land or the environmental impact assessment procedures that are mandatory for many types of investments.

Magdalena Stretton, the director of environmental business at Arcadis, an engineering and consultancy firm, agrees that environmental issues permeate the business at every level. Her daily practice is environmental consulting, and she leads a practice that provides technical expertise to renewable energy and transport infrastructure projects.

Often times, environmental ideas were imported into Poland from abroad, where several of these ladies have spent time during their careers.

Joanna Schulders, head of the project department at UBM, a developer, whose portfolio includes LEED Silver and LEED Gold-certified office projects Poleczki Business Park in Warsaw and Alma Tower in Kraków, brings with her years of experience working in Germany, one of Europe’s top markets for sustainable buildings. Germany has also shown fortitude to transition their energy economy away from fossil fuels toward renewables in a policy project known as Energiewende. Ms. Schulders was heavily influenced by the environmental business practices she learned in Germany.

On an operational level, recalls Katar-

zyna Zawodna, regional director at Skanska Property Poland, it took only a few years for environmental thinking to manifest itself as a daily reality in the real estate sector. “Four years ago, when I first started to talk about buildings’ certification, it was a very foreign concept. Today, it seems, all new office buildings are certified. An entire epoch has passed,” she said.

“These sustainability measures aren’t raising development costs much, but have become necessary for new buildings because they do have an effect on energy cost and service charges. So green buildings are going to be in demand from tenants, which will give further momentum to developers,” said Regina Gul, senior project manager and a BREEAM/LEED expert at Jones Lang LaSalle, a real estate agency.

For Anna Czyż, senior consultant and team leader in the construction and property division at HAYS, a human resources company, the cycle of change has been even faster. “I’m coming across issues of energy efficiency, renewables, sustainability in buildings.

From the perspective of human resources, it’s changed so quickly: two years ago, when we were looking for an architect with experience in sustainable buildings, there were very few in Poland,” she said. 

“Four years ago, when I first started to talk about a building’s certification, it was a very foreign concept. Today, it seems, all new office buildings are certified.

An entire epoch has passed” Katarzyna Zawodna, Skanska Property Poland

People

Katarzyna Zawodna

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Svetlana Robinson 48 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

People

Joanna Wis-Bielewicz

Magdalena Stretton

Anna CzyĹź

Renata Kusznierska www.cleantechpoland.com | 49

Kinga Nowakowska

Regina Gul

Aneta Więcka

Joanna Schulders

50 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

People

Agnieszka Kozłowska-Korbicz

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Devin Saylor

Isabelle Clerc

Agata Wr贸bel

Ewa Rutkowska-Subocz

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People

NEW FRONTIERS, NEW CHALLENGES The “green” in business keeps growing, annexing new previously virgin territories.

Renata Kusznierska, soon to take over as head of retail agency at DTZ, a real estate services company, says the retail sector is now embracing green certification at top speed. Whether it’s BREEAM-In-Use for existing properties, or LEED-Platinum for new ones, the trend is here to stay. “Today, you can pick your jewelry and clothes from LED-lit displays, something that retailers used to dismiss, but the LED technology is no longer an unattractive cold light,” Ms. Kusznierska said.

Next in line is residential. Although great strides have been made in commercial construction, Poland has yet to adopt widespread environmental best practices for residential units. “It’s time for residential developments to get on board,” said Agata Wróbel, formerly of Polnord. Polnord is an office, retail and residential developer and the company now stands to deliver what might be Warsaw’s leading sustainable residential development scheme. It’s called Port Praski, to be developed on the premises of a former river port, a brownfield project.

Away from the city, Joanna WisBielewicz is project director at EkoMiasteczko Siewierz from TUP, a development company. Siewierz is a town of 5,500 people in Silesia, southern Poland where TUP is developing a wholly new, sustainable district (see p. 60).

“Sustainable city is foremost about creating communities where people want to live, work and spend their free time.

That’s why cafes, parks, amenities and services are part of the solution. Our project will create entirely different expectations toward living standards in Poland,” said Ms. Wis-Bielewicz. The

“I’ve always been an environmentalist at heart. You need to believe in it to work in it” Kinga Nowakowska, Capital Park Siewierz project will be exactly that: a community, she adds.

Kinga Anasiewicz-Zaręba and Aneta Więcka are two examples of women taking leadership roles in renewable energy. Ms. Anasiewicz-Zaręba is an up and coming business coordinator at Vestas, a wind equipment manufacturer, managing sales in a sector that since 2005 has trended consistently upward. Ms. Więcka, in turn, is doing work behind the scenes at the Institute for Renewable Energy, lobbying for regulations to improve the renewable energy investment climate in a coalfired economy.

For Devin Saylor, director of sustainability and commercial development at Skanska Property Poland, there’s a great need for educating tenants to reap the benefits of an emerging renewable energy economy. “If the systems in the buildings are misused, the building underperforms. You need to ask yourself questions: is it the facility manager mishandling them? Is your energy model off? Well I think it’s tenants that need educated in most cases,” Ms. Saylor said.

Slowly, the sustainability trend is reaching back to older properties that investment funds hold. According to Isabelle Clerc, head of asset management Central Europe at AEW Europe investment fund, funds are thus making their older assets more liquid (saleable) in case they sell them on to other investors, but also because funds (as landlords) also wish the charges to be as low as possible, lowering the global rental effort for the tenant.

I CARE FOR FUTURE Now that the first quick growth phase seems to have been completed, it’s time to marry growth with quality, says Svetlana Robinson, event director at Future4Build, a Sapphire Ventures company. Ms. Robinson’s Future4Build, an event for green construction professionals, will take place in Warsaw for the third time this year. “There was a big need to put the construction sector and the services sectors together on the issue of green buildings: how to understand what green construction is and how it changes behavior of the consumer,” Ms. Robinson said.

To be held after Future4Build, the most important environmental event is taking place, the 19th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the so-called COP19. Agnieszka Kozłowska-Korbicz leads the COP19 organization team (she’s also the creator of GreenEvo program to promote Polish green technologies abroad). COP19 will gather 10,000 people who will iron out the terms of a global climate change accord.

Ms. Kozłowska-Korbicz hopes to stress individual responsibility, via the COP19 slogan “I Care”. “It’s not ‘we care’ because that message dilutes responsibility. It’s the I that needs to care,” she said.

At least one of our leading ladies has long been convinced of the good sense in marrying environmental protection to business. “I’ve always been an environmentalist at heart. You need to believe in it to work in it,” said Kinga Nowakowska, of Capital Park, a development company.

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Kinga Anasiewicz-Zaręba 54 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

a d v e r t o r i al

Ms. Areta Kempińska has been a partner of Bireta Translations since 2002 where she coordinates the written and oral translation departments.

Ms. Areta KempiNska

picture: BIRETA

One of the most challenging projects we are working on right now would be a waste-to-energy facility, which is being built for the City of Poznań.

Bireta - eleven years of technical translation services

W

hat’s your background and when did you go into business for yourself?

Both my business partner and I worked as translators prior to starting Bireta. I have a Masters in English Philology from the University of Warsaw and my business partner Joanna Woźniakowska has a Masters and Engineering Degree from Warsaw Polytechnic.

How did you get into specialized translation of cleantech-related technical documents?

Over the past eleven years, Bireta Translations earned the trust of clients in the energy, gas and environmental protection sector. Thanks to our 30 in-house employees and 40 cooperating freelance translators we can turnaround more than 200 pages a day. For instance, we worked on the Stalowa Wola CHPP project (Abener), Bełchatów Power Plant (Alstom), Bydgoszcz CCPP (Siemens) and Gorzów CHPP (Ansaldo).

ware allow translators and verifiers to work on the same document and maintain cohesion and consistency within the text. The proofreaders verify consistency and correctness. Finally the documents are checked that they reflect the original layout.

What’s a good example of a few challenging projects in the cleantech space?

One of the most challenging projects we are working on right now would be a waste-to-energy facility, which is being built for the City of Poznań by our clients Hochtief, Hitachi Zosen Inova and Sita Zielona Góra. Another one would be new power unit being built

in Kozienice where we work for Consortium of Hitachi and Polimex.

What’s one activity you like to do that your clients might not know?

I love skiing in winter and windsurfing in summer. I also workout daily which I alternate with running. I feel exercise gives me a lot of energy and keeps my spirits high.

Where can your clients find you, or connect with you?

In addition to being members of several notable associations, from November 27-28, 2013 we will be present at Terrapinn Shale Gas World Europe in the Cleantech Pavilion.

picture: BIRETA

How do you handle the workflow of such complex projects?

We use specialized software for translation service providers such as SDL Trados Studio and ApSICXbench. The soft-

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| 55

Future4Build ness platform is an innovative busi sents sustainable re p ly e v si n e h re p m which co deration si n co to in g in k ta y b development issues l aspects. a ci so d n a l a g le , ic m environmental, econo wards our planet to n io ss a p g n ro st a We hold ness community, si u b g in w ro g a s a d n a ection are heading in the dir le cities, of building sustainab nomic driven by the socio-eco enefits, and environmental b t ways. smarter, energy efficien ute As a result, we contrib n footprint to reducing the carbo of the whole country. ing Together, we are build community the leading conference pment for sustainable develo gs because better buildin build better business.

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6-7 November 2013 oland P , w a rs a W I, X X O P X E 56 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

REGISTER before 10.10.2013 AND SAVE.future4buildP.cLoNm! www

499

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GREEN BUILDING

GREEN BUILDING

LEFT LITTLE choice Green building isn’t only a marketing tool. The investment market is asking developers to certify their projects or face a loss of revenue, assessing “non-certified” buildings as more likely to be obsolete sooner.

Developers, on the other hand, have embraced green thinking so that certification is no longer a goal in and of itself. Some would do it anyway.

co n t e n t s l P58 Green philosophy means certification l P60 Double down on

sustainability l P61 Green office, use reponsibly! l P62 Be green or be obsolete l P64 Lost in technicalitiesl P65-74 Green Building Director y: from A4 to Warsaw Spire

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G R E E N C E R T I F I C AT I O N

Aim sweet and center:

build to rent Everybody seems to certify their office development these days according to LEED or BREEAM standards.

For David Pettersson, development and construction director at SwedeCenter, a developer, certification is just a logical consequence of the company’s green philosophy.

I N T E R V I E W B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

There’s also an opinion that the very top levels of certification aren’t much more than marketing tools because tenants won’t be affected by working in a LEED Platinum building anyway.

Do you agree?

On the contrary, top certification levels do make a difference for tenants.

There are many ways to get your LEED 58 | CLeantech |fall |FALL 2013

Who does it take to run the certification process and what does this work involve?

A person coordinating certification process has to work with a lot of documentation in the first place. Due to the nature of the certification process, where you get points for a number of criteria that will be met thanks to external products and services, however, that person needs to work with subcontractors, service providers, vendors and also know their products well. One example: certain types of paint with high volatile organic compounds content cannot be used in order to get one of the credits in LEED - you need to know this if you’re running the certification process and you need to be on top on the updates to the criteria.

Do you think that LEED and BREEAM are the same?

They come from different traditions.

To get a BREEAM certification, you

creative commons

score up a few points to the Platinum level that are practical and easy. For example: less water consuming toilets or internal sunblinds to prevent light pollution.

swedecenter

I heard an opinion that “pre-certification is not anything real, because it doesn’t mean 100 percent that certification will be obtained.”

Why do developers often announce pre-certification?

Pre-certification is your signal to the market about your plans so that your clients, tenants, can make decisions whether to work with you or not. It doesn’t mean that you will certainly get certified, but it’s not up to any external factors, but only up to you. And since pre-certification is based on certificatespecific documentation, developers will most of the time go on and certify. You can call pre-certification a marketing tool, but one that you must follow up on and do the real thing eventually.

need to work with a BREEAM-approved assessor, whereas in the case of LEED, there are no independent assessors, but you have to follow the LEED guidelines and get your project approved by the US Green Building Council. Typically, the USGBC first does a preliminary review of the project, which takes roughly five weeks and they get back to you about what you need to improve, change, or update.

Then final review follows, which takes another five weeks. We have just had our first project in Poland certified at the LEED-Gold level, Brama Portowa I in Szczecin.

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“ How much integrity are there in certification systems? For example can you build a super energy efficient building away from forms of public transport and still get a certification?

In theory yes, but only in theory. Certification systems are real-life tools for developers. At SwedeCenter, we don’t develop office projects in order to get them certified, but in order to get them rented. But our policy is to build them in a way that we believe they should be built, which is “green”. Certification is a logical consequence of our approach, not a goal in itself. If there were no cer-

tification systems in place, our projects would not change.

Do you think that we are close to commercially developed zero net energy passive office buildings?

I think we’re heading in that direction. Brama Portowa I reaches the tightness level for a passive building.

What other projects is SwedeCenter currently working on and what’s their certification status?

There are three Business Garden projects under construction: in War-

We don’t develop office projects in order to get them certified, but in order to get them rented.

We believe they should be built “green”. Certification is a logical consequence of our approach, not a goal in itself”

saw, Poznań, and Wrocław. Building 2 of Warsaw’s phase 1 is under review for LEED. Also under review there’s Brama Portowa II in Szczecin. The first buildings in Poznań and Wrocław, both in phase 1, are pre-certified for LEEDGold. Finally, Gdynia Waterfront is also under construction now and will also be certified for LEED.

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TUP

Warsaw-listed property investor and development company TUP has exited all of its project bar one: a greenfield project of sustainable town where living will mix with testing innovative cleantech technologies.

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

Downtown Warsaw isn’t the best place to commute to work by bike. Still, Robert J. Moritz, CEO of TUP, a Warsaw-listed real estate investor and development firm, is parking his bike outside his office door. His hopes the residents of Siewierz Jeziorna, a so-called “sustainable town” he’s developing, will do the same.

The town’s first two hectares are under way in Siewierz, a southern town conveniently located by A4 highway to Katowice. Overall, TUP, via its special purpose vehicle Chmielowskie, owns close to 120 hectares in Siewierz. In 12 to 15 years, Mr. Moritz says, a new part of Siewierz will be ready to take in residents and companies. At the moment, houses are under construction of 100-150 square meters in size at up to PLN 500,000 (€117,000) a piece. The project’s first phase will be completed by end of 2014.

To pull off the Siewierz project, TUP has adopted a new strategy until 2020 that assumes exiting all other compa60 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

S U S TA I N A B L E C I T I E S

Double down

on sustainability ny’s investment projects and an exclusive focus on the sustainable urban project in Siewierz. ‘We have the biggest potential for return on investment there,” Mr. Moritz told Cleantech.

Other than that, he claims that doing a greenfield urban project that will provide residents and companies a friendly environment to live and work in gives the investor an opportunity to fully control the process.

“It’s about the management: building a new town from scratch on a land that’s not indebted, we can execute our vision in 100 percent in terms of planning, energy supplies, water and waste management, green areas and so on.

Something that’s hardly attainable in isolated real estate projects in cities,” Mr. Moritz said.

That said, he quickly dismisses a question on whether Siewierz’s new part will one day become a zero-energy urban environment.

“Let’s not dream. I don’t think that this is ever going to be possible. Of course we could pack the project full with renewable energy installations but I don’t think we’d be able to balance the load unless we invest substantial capital in infrastructure. We won’t need to do that if we have part of the energy

that we need come from a utility,” Mr. Moritz said.

The utility that will provide the staple of the power that Siewierz will need is Tauron. Other than that, some of the power demand will be covered by rooftop PV and solar thermal installations and a small biomass power plant.

Using the conventional coal-firing utility that Tauron is could raise eyebrows in the case of a project that’s described as sustainable but Mr. Moritz says he offsets this elsewhere.

“This will be a compact urban area, far from your typical urban sprawl landscape, so car use will be reduced.

Residents will be able to reach any point in town by no more than 10 minutes on foot. Land plots on which houses will stand won’t be big so there’s no need to use too much water or fertilizers,” Mr. Moritz said.

“I think that sustainability doesn’t have to mean only sophisticated technologies, you can be sustainable using simple practical solutions,” he said.

But there should be room in Siewierz for advanced technologies, after all.

TUP plans that part of the area will be developed into a cleantech park where companies will carry out R&D projects for the future.

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Do you know that feeling you get when your child breaks an expensive toy because you failed to teach him or her how to play with it? Developers and property managers, too, need to parent their tenants.

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

It used to be easy. Tenants would move into a new office building and just start using it. After all, a light switch used to turn on a light and a toilet button used to flush a toilet.

But not so anymore, especially not in green buildings. There may be no light switches and toilet buttons at all. Still, power and water systems need to be managed by tenants.

Today, developers and property managers need to explain that leasing ultramodern, energy efficient, renewablepowered office space is just the first step. The next step is to take out the instruction booklet and to get familiar with how the building works.

HANDS OFF, KIND OF New office buildings come complete with smart controls that often distance the human factor from controlling lighting, heating or cooling.

But an analysis of the data on green building’s performance may reveal that the expected gains on the tenants’ utility bills fall short of what the developer promised. This can happen if the facility manager fails to involve tenants in what constitutes a proper relationship with the building.

“Just because a building is certified doesn’t mean it will always perform as it was designed to perform. If tenants aren’t trained how to use systems in the building, it will underperform. It’s like driving a hybrid-car: it’s not enough just to drive it, you need to drive it the right way,” said Waldemar Olbryk, country manager of Skanska Property Poland, a developer.

GREEN OFFICES

Green office,

use responsibly Educating tenants means giving them, for example, a tour of the building to explain how lighting or heating systems work. Only this way will they know if opening a window - if it’s allowed - has an influence on the building’s HVAC systems. For instance, raising indoor temperatures and announcing a dress-down week for employees during the summer will lead to energy savings, if only the employees are notified of management’s plans.

WASTE NOT, WANT NOT A recent change in how waste is collected in Poland, following a longoverdue introduction of an EU directive, will now add a new educational aspect to the relationship between facility manager and tenant. Tenants will need explained what they can collect into what containers. A well managed waste output from an office tower will result in smaller fees from the waste utility.

According to Mr. Olbryk, owners and manager of the buildings should avoid simple “do this” communication to tenants and involve them in reward programs to incentivize desired behavior.

“A game where you score points for,

say, turning off lights or using stairs instead of the lift could be motivating for people,” he said.

On the other hand, it won’t be enough for developers and facility managers just to explain tenants how a building works, give them a set of rules to follow, throw in a game to garner extra motivation, and forget about the rest.

Some of green office buildings in Warsaw have been in use long enough to analyze the data in order to identify performance gaps. With this data in hand, regular feedback to tenants will become necessary. For instance, management of Rondo ONZ produces a newsletter to keep tenants informed of its green management techniques.

Involving tenants in facility management will increase as technology will make it possible for developers to offer passive office space as standard. “It’s only a question of relevant technologies becoming cost-feasible, which is going to happen sooner or later. In case of big office buildings offering big space for tenants, passive buildings will mean substantial savings on energy bills, a no-brainer for all parties involved,” said Kinga Nowakowska, head of asset management, sales and marketing at Capital Park, an investment firm.

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ghelamco

INVESTMENT

Build green or face fate:

obsolescence Investment funds want to hedge against what they call obsolescence - the idea that ten years from now buildings will be perceived as aged, possibly irrelevant.

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

62 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

When sustainability was a new idea, early promoters of greening the property sector had a popular slide in their presentations that showed how the push to develop green buildings will come from all stakeholders in the development cycle.

It went like this: tenants would put pressure on developers after top executives would adopt CSR policies to lease office space in energy efficient, environmentally friendly buildings.

Developers would respond, seeing an opportunity to lease their property, so that it could be sold well - but of course, only if a building’s green credentials mattered to an investment fund. After all the investment fund is the final buyer.

Each transaction reinforced another in the spin put out there about green buildings, despite a higher construction cost.

DICTATING THE RULES That sweet harmony is no more. Today, investment funds‘ acquisition of green property isn‘t reinforcing anyone, but rather dictates what the development pipeline must be, so each half year the green building pipeline increases.

Although only six percent of existing office space in Warsaw and five percent in the largest regional cities in Poland have sustainability certificates, it‘s entirely different in the case of buildings under development. In Warsaw, 66 per-

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cent of currently developed office space has been either granted preliminary certification or has applied for it. In the largest regional cities, about 30 percent of space under construction is being developed in line with green development policy.

Most of these projects are competing to be sold to foreign investment funds that are rather clear about what kind of office property they’re after. Typically, certified properties are sought by so-called core funds, or ones whose investment policy focuses on properties in best locations, with good long term lease structure. Their buys are usually long-term. In other words, if a building isn’t certified, the coveted buyers that core funds are, will very likely disregard it – with an impact on yield and price.

Few developers could afford that.

A recent example of an acquisition of a core property by a core fund is the Union Investment Real Estate’s purchase of the Senator office new build in Warsaw, a development from Ghelamco.

The BREEAM Very Good-certified project comprises around 25,000 square

meters of rental space and was completed in September 2012. Union Investment paid €120 million for the asset and was the first acquisition of Union Investment‘s open-ended real estate fund UniImmo: Europa on the Polish office property market.

“This investment boosts the geographical diversification of the fund’s portfolio and further reduces the average age of its holdings,” said Reinhard Kutscher, the fund’s CEO said in a Union Investment press release.

GREEN NOW, EVERGREEN Mr. Kutschner’s remark referring to the average age of his fund’s most recent buy in Poland reveals an important criterion that funds take into account while checklisting properties they’re looking to acquire.

According to 2013 office occupiers‘ survey carried out by CBRE, a real estate agency, for institutional tenants and investors, an important criterion of a given office building evaluation is its ability to withstand obsolescence, both in terms of the market and functional-

ity. A green building certification helps to create an objective standard, granting a building some resistance to obsolescence.

Therefore, green building certification should not be a goal in itself, but rather a means to prove that the given building will continue to be ecologically sustainable even in the long-term perspective, CBRE research notes.

But what’s going to happen once all new offices are certified while older ones will get retrofitted?

It’s likely that buildings in comparable locations will compete for investors with technological solutions applied to reduce energy and water use, or moving ahead by early adopting of today’s novelties that will take some time to become common.

A good example from today’s market in Poland is providing parking spaces for low emission vehicles and charging points for electric cars.

The race will go on until it reaches the next milestone: zero net energy buildings powered with renewable energy only. This, however, is some time away still.

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S U B S I D I Z E D HO U S I N G

Lost in

technicalities A subsidized housing program in which banks offer preferential loan conditions for individuals and developers has turned out to be a flop. No one wants to participate because the options are too narrow.

In early September, media like Puls Biznesu, reported on the first investor in Poland who is going to benefit from the governmentsupported program subsidizing the construction of energy-efficient houses and flats.

The house that will receive the funding is 118 square meters and will spend on heating 33 kWh per square meter per annum, well below the average energy use per square meter, which is 90120 kWh for buildings from 1998 or younger. The house’s total cost: PLN 410,000 (€97,000). The cost paid back from the government program: PLN 30,000 (€7,000), which will be paid upon the house’s inspection by a verified auditor. The subsidy is disbursed via banks granting loans from the funds available through the National Fund of Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOŚiGW).

It seems, however, that the unnamed individual, despite being future-minded and demonstrating environmental care, won’t have many followers. While it’s hard to predict what individuals will do, developers, who can also apply for the subsidy with their multi-flat residential projects, are negative about the program.

64 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

press materials

B y W o j c ie c h K o ś ć

Developers resent what they say is the program’s narrow focus on technicalities. The government has supplied a defined list of criteria for technological solutions that can be used or projects won’t qualify for the subsidy. For example, in the case of heating there’s a requirement to use a biomass-only boiler (only wood is allowed) with an efficiency of at least 82 percent. It’s possible, developers say, to use less efficient boiler and make up for it using other solutions elsewhere.

According to the Polish Association of Developers (PZFD), an industry group, the list supplied by the government is stifling innovation and gives little incentive to particpate. “There are companies on the Polish market that build houses and flats with energy efficiency at the level of 40 kWh per square meter per year but don’t fulfill the technological criteria set out by the program,” said Konrad Płochocki, general director of PZFD.

According to Mr. Płochocki, no residential project in Poland would be elegible to take part in the subsidy program today.

Among developers, only JW Construction has said it’s going to develop in line with the program’s requirements, at least one project for the time being.

“We’re also working to help our clients walk through the procedures to get the subsidy,” said Małgorzata Ostrowska, sales and marketing director at JW Construction.

Banks that are financing most residential projects in Poland appear skeptical about taking part as well. Only the Bank of Environmental Protection (where the NFOŚiGW is a major stakeholder) and two cooperatives’ banks are granting the subsidized loans. Despite declarations, other banks are still having second thoughts on joining.

Without larger banks, BOŚ won’t be able to give the program the momentum it needs to take off.

directory In association with Savills, Cleantech presents the forthcoming certified office space pipeline in Poland. Apart from basic data about each project, the directory lists the main green features of each building that could weigh upon companies' lease decisions.

According to Savills, tenants have now best 12-18 months to pick space from the rising tide of new developments.

A4 Business Park Developer: Echo Investment Location: Katowice Total GLA (m2): 9,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Interim (I phase), phases II and III under certification preparations Planned completion: Q1 2014 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l 30% energy use reduction

Alma Tower Developer: UBM Polska Location: Kraków Total GLA (m2): 10,400 Green Building Certification: LEED CS Platinum pre-certified Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Alma Market, KrakChemia, Vistula Group, Gastromall

GREEN FEATURES l CO2 reduction of 30% l water use reduction of 40% l energy use reduction of 25% l 6 parking spaces for LEVs* l daylight access in entire building

ART NORBLIN Developer: CAPITAL PARK Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 64,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q4 2016 Consultant: Buro Happold Major tenants: Piotr i Paweł

GREEN FEATURES l waste to energy for heating l very easy access to public transit l 21 electric cars charging points l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l zoning of heating/cooling/lighting

systems * Low Emissions Vehicles

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&

ATRIUM 1 Developer: Skanska Property Poland Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 16,300 Green Building Certification: LEED PLATINUM Planned completion: Q4 2013 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Skanska Property Poland, G4E

GREEN FEATURES l geothermal heating/cooling l PV panels l cooling beams l gray and rain water usage l LED lighting l FSC*-certified wood

BARTYCKA (1st phase) Developer: PHN Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 68,685 Green Building Certification: in preparation Planned completion: 2016; 2nd phase 2017 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l none specified

Business Garden PoznaN Developer: SwedeCenter Location: Poznań Total GLA (m2): 1st phase 42,000 Green Building Certification: LEED Gold Planned completion: Q4 2014 Consultants: AF, WSP, FSD, CMT, Arcade, Apexa Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l cooling beams l green roofs, reduction of heat

island effect l rain water use l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l energy efficient lighting, heating

Business Garden Warszawa Developer: SwedeCenter Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 2nd phase 57,000 Green Building Certification: LEED Gold Planned completion: Q1 2016 Consultants: AF, WSP, FSD, IBS, CMT, Arcade, Revensa Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l energy efficient lighting, heating l cooling beams l green roofs, reduction of heat island

effect l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l rain water use

Business Garden Wrocław Developer: SwedeCenter Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): 30,000 Green Building Certification: LEED Gold Planned completion: Q1 2016 Consultants: AF, WSP, FSD, Akustikon, IBS, Arcade, Apexa Major tenants: Not available

66 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

GREEN FEATURES l energy efficient lighting, heating l cooling beams l green roofs, reduction of heat

island effect l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l rain water use

* Forest Stewardship Council

GREEN FEATURES l advanced HVAC systems

EUROCENTRUM OFFICE COMPLEX Developer: CAPITAL PARK Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 69,186 Green Building Certification: LEED CS GOLD Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultants: PRC / Arup, Tebodin Poland Major tenants: Unilever, Imtech Polska, Tebodin, Qumak, CEPD Management (Pelion SA), Randstad Polska

GREEN FEATURES l rain water use l locally sourced construction

materials, FSC-certified wood l reduction of heat island effect l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l 22 electric cars charging points

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s p e c i a l

Developer: PHN Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 28,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very Good Planned completion: Q3 2015 Consultant: Arcadis Major tenants: Poczta Polska

G R EE N B U IL D I N G

DOMANIEWSKA

FOKSAL Developer: PHN Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 3,271 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very Good Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultants: Portico Project Management, Cushman&Wakefield Polska, Grontmij Polska Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l green roof l VRV* HVAC technology

Galeria Amber Developer: Echo Investment Location: Kalisz Total GLA (m2): 33,500 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Interim Planned completion: Q1 2014 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: E.Leclerc, Helios, H&M, New Yorker, Wojas, Reserved, C&A, Deichmann, Kazar

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l energy use reduction of 30%

GARDEN PLAZA Developer: SGB FORTUNE MA Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 8,520 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultant: Buro Happold Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l zoned HVAC, lighting systems l facade with high insulation l infrastructure, amenities for

bikers l green waste management l daylight access in entire building

GREEN DAY Developer: Skanska Property Poland Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): 15,900 Green Building Certification: LEED GOLD Planned completion: Q1 2014 Consultant: Skanska Property Poland/G4E Major tenants: Credit Suisse

GREEN FEATURES l daylight control l freecooling, fan coils l high efficiency heat recovery l FSC-certified wood l low VOC**-content materials

Greenwings Offices Developer: OKRE Development, Greenwings Offices Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 10,810 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very good Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultant: SECO Poland branch

68 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

GREEN FEATURES l zoned heating, cooling, lighting systems l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l high quality of indoor air

* Variable Refrigerant Volume, ** Volatile Organic Compounds

GREEN FEATURES l low VOC-content materials l water saving system l grey and rain water usage l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l temperature control in each room

KAPELANKA Developer: Skanska Property Poland Location: Krak贸w Total GLA (m2): 30,000 Green Building Certification: LEED GOLD Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultant: Skanska Property Poland/G4E Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l freecooling, fan coils l high efficiency heat recovery l FSC-certified wood l daylight control l low VOC-content materials

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Developer: OKRE Development, OKRE Gr贸jecka Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 7,390 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q4 2015/Q1 2016 Consultant: not available Major tenants: not available

G R EE N B U IL D I N G

Gr贸jecka Offices

KAROLKOWA BUSINESS PARK Developer: Asbud Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): Office: 12,503; Retail: 2,568 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q2 2014 Consultant: Gleeds Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l green roof l daylight access in entire building l energy efficient HVAC l heat recovery ventilation system

MALTA HOUSE Developer: Skanska Property Poland Location: Poznań Total GLA (m2): 14,800 Green Building Certification: LEED PLATINUM Planned completion: Q2 2013 Consultant: Skanska Property Poland/G4E Major tenants: Franklin Templeton ,Ciber, Skanska SA

GREEN FEATURES l daylight control l freecooling, fan coils l high efficiency heat recovery l FSC-certified wood l low VOC-content materials

Metropolis Developer: Echo Investment Location: Poznań, Total GLA (m2): 73,300 Green Building Certification: W trakcie uzyskiwania BREEAM Interim Planned completion: H1 2015 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l energy use reduction of 30%

NC3 Developer: ECI Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 6,121 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very Good Planned completion: Q4 2015 Consultant: Hill International Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l energy sourced from renewables l daylight access in entire building l energy use reduction of 30% l LED lighting l grey and rain water usage l electric cars charging points

Nettuno Developer: Bouygues Immobilier Polska Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 20,330 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very good Planned completion: Q4 2015 Consultant: ARUP, Fort Polska Major tenants: Not available

70 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

GREEN FEATURES l optimised facade design l fan coils l LED lighting l energy gains from lift operation

GREEN FEATURES l energy use reduction of 11% l 100% energy sourced from renew-

ables l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l electric cars charging point l quatquodi idebit aut

Park Rozwoju Developer: Echo Investment Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 32,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Interim, BRREAM In-Use planned Planned completion: Q2 2015 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Schneider Electric

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l energy use reduction of 30%

Prime Corporate Center Developer: Golub GetHouse Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 20,148 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very Good Planned completion: H2 2015 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l LED-lit facade l energy efficient HVAC systems l heat recovery system l daylight access in entire building l sunblinds preventing overheating

Promenady Epsilon Zita Developer: Vantage Development Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): 22,110 Green Building Certification: LEED Gold Planned completion: Q1 2015 Consultant: Arup, SNC Lavalin, Imtech, Buro Happold itd Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l none specified

Q22 Developer: Echo Investment Location: Warszawa Total GLA (m2): 50,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q1 2016 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l PV panels l energy use reduction of 30% l electric cars charging points

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Developer: Yareal Polska Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 18,400 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very good Planned completion: Bldg A: completed, Bldg B: Q4 2013 Consultant: GRRES Major tenants: Merck, Sodexo

G R EE N B U IL D I N G

Oxygen Park

RONDO DASZYnSKIEGO Developer: Skanska Property Poland Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): I phase 20,000 Green Building Certification: LEED PLATINUM Planned completion: Q1 2016 Consultant: Skanska Property Poland/G4E Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l freecooling, fan coils l high efficiency heat recovery l FSC-certified wood l daylight control l low VOC-content materials

ROYAL WILANÓW Developer: CAPITAL PARK Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 36,700 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q3 2015 Consultant: Grontmij Polska Major tenants: PIOTR I PAWEŁ, ERBUD

GREEN FEATURES l water/energy efficiency l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l minimized impact on plot’s biodiver-

sity

Shopping and Entertainment Centre Sukcesja Developer: Fabryka Biznesu Location: Łódź Total GLA (m2): 51,292 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: 2014 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Piotr i Paweł, Reserved, Mohito, Cropp, House i Sinsay, Helios, Rossmann, Avans, Pure Health & Fitness, Top Secret

GREEN FEATURES l heat pumps l LED-lighting l green roof l rain water usage

SOBIESKI BUSINESS PARK Developer: Arkady Sobieskiego Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 8,150 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Very Good Planned completion: Q4 2014 Consultant: Tebodin Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l energy gains from lift operation l grey water usage l infrastructure, amenities for bikers

STAWKI 2 (1st phase) Developer: PHN Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): 34,000 Green Building Certification: Not available Planned completion: phase 1 Q4 2015; phase 2 Q1 2019 Consultant: Hill International Major tenants: Not available

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GREEN FEATURES l none specified

GREEN FEATURES l none specified

The Park Warsaw Developer: AIG/Lincoln Polska Location: Warsaw Total GLA (m2): Overall: 110,000, 1st building 10,838 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Excellent Planned completion: Bldg 1 2013, bldg 2 2014 Consultant: BCHF Major tenants: Qloc, Cenega Poland, Johnson Controls International, Perfetti Van Melle Polska

GREEN FEATURES l energy efficient external lighting l submetering of energy use l rain water usage l zones lighting, heating systems l low VOC-content materials

Times II Developer: UBM Polska Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): offices 17,000, services 2,500 Green Building Certification: certyfikat LEED CS Planned completion: Q3/4 2015 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l CO2 reduction of 30% l water use reduction of 40% l energy use reduction of 25% l infrastructure, amenities for bikers

Tryton Developer: Echo Investment Location: Gdańsk Total GLA (m2): 22,000 Green Building Certification: BRREAM Interim Planned completion: H1 2015 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l energy use reduction of 30%

West Gate Developer: Echo Investment Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): 16 000 Green Building Certification: BRREAM Interim (trwa proces) Planned completion: Q4 2014 Consultant: Not available Major tenants: Not available

GREEN FEATURES l infrastructure, amenities for bikers l water leaks detection system l energy use reduction of 30%

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Developer: Ghelamco Location: Wrocław Total GLA (m2): 70,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: 2015/2016 Consultant: Grontmij Major tenants: Not available

G R EE N B U IL D I N G

Synergy Business Park

Warsaw Spire Developer: Ghelamco Location: Warszawa Total GLA (m2): 100,000 Green Building Certification: BREEAM Planned completion: Q2 2015 Consultant: Grontmij Major tenants: Frontex

GREEN FEATURES l none specfied

COMMENT

Choose your

green office, now

The 40 green office projects that this issue of Cleantech lists in the Directory make for a substantial part of the office development pipeline in Poland. We asked Tomasz Buras, director and head of office agency at Savills, which helped compile the list, about the relevance of green buildings to the office property market as a whole. interview B y W ojciech K o ś ć

74 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

Certified office buildings are now standard among virtually all new developments. But there are no absolutely binding regulations about building green.

So how did green become a standard?

There is a simple answer to this. Developers need to offload their office projects to buyers, the majority of which are investment funds. These entities typically invest long term and value buildings that stand the best chance of yielding stable revenue. As the environmental trends in business gained ground, these funds quickly understood that the value lies in buildings that are energy-efficient, have small carbon footprint and so on. The moment the funds readjusted their investment criteria, developers had little choice but to adapt. Otherwise, the range of potential buyers would be very narrow.

What market are these new buildings coming into?

In short, Warsaw today is a market of increasing development activity. Up to 1.1 million square meters will be completed by 2015 year end according to developers’ plans. About 52 percent of this is under construction, while the remainder is at planning stage or will commence subject to prelet. If you’re a tenant moving to Warsaw for the first time or looking to move into a new of-

fice space in the city, you will now have 12-18 month-long window of opportunity during which developers will do their best to secure that you take up space in their projects.

Is green certification part of developers’ fighting to secure tenants?

On one hand, top certification levels are, in my opinion, irrelevant for tenants who mostly care about first-hand experience and not plant species on the roof. But the Warsaw office market is maturing, now as it passed the mark of 4m sqm of office space. There are tenants that will be moving offices third or fourth time now because they’ve learned ultimately what their needs are.

If these tenants developed sustainable policies in the meantime, certified office space will certainly matter in choosing new office location. And as I said, there will be many relocations in Warsaw in the next 18 months.

“

The moment the funds readjusted their investment criteria, developers had little choice but to adapt”

www.cleantechpoland.com | 75

COP19

Can Poland

pull it off

The United Nations’ annual climate conference COP19 is coming to Poland for the second time in five years. Can a climate action-skeptic country make it a success?

Five years ago, during COP14 in Poznań, neither did Poland have a particularly bad record concerning international climate policy, nor was there absolute pressure to get things done at the conference. Today, Warsaw has a somewhat radicalized position on what Poland and the EU can and should do about climate policy.

The 2013 negotiations, which could pave the way for a global accord to fight climate change that takes effect in 2020, are taking place in a country that would wish to claim the EU’s climate action efforts are meaningless unless the rest of the world joins in. This, in turn, is giving ground to nasty rhetoric that’s based upon a weakening environmentalism and reckless industrialism.

It’s happening in the rest of the EU, but its arguments are being championed in Poland at the highest levels. A recent example: Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk pointed to lignite, the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel, as one that Poland will bet on in the foreseeable future. “If we are able to win a big-

tadeuszpro flickr

By Wojciech Kość

ger approval for lignite in Europe, Poland will be in a very good position,” Mr Tusk said early in 2013, adding that the fuel will play a “key role in the Polish energy sector in the years to come.”

There also seems to be a great deal of misunderstanding within the Polish political class and the media about both the scientific foundations of climate change theory and the goal of COP19.

An prominent example of what COP19 is understood to represent came this summer during a routine journalistic check into the costs of the conference. The PLN 100 million (€25 million) price tag was said to exorbitant

by Polsat News TV. “PLN 100 million to organize a conference that could result in more expensive electricity?” concluded reporter Grzegorz Kępka, while ending his report on the subject - a message whose simplicity must have

“PLN 100 million to organize a conference that could result in more expensive electricity?” Polsat News TV headline about COP 19 76 | CLeantech |FALL 2013

resonated with many ordinary Poles.

Characteristic is the way in which Polish politicians avoid referring directly to climate change theory, to which no refutation has been published in peer-reviewed journals in at least a decade. “Global climate changes are a normal natural phenomena, which have accompanied human race from its beginnings,” Ewa Wolak, MP of the ruling Civic Platform, told Cleantech.

Ms. Wolak’s reaction seems to typify what many politicians say in reference to taking action in the wake of proof that the climate is changing for the worse.

The COP19 presidency, hosted by Poland, and presided over by the ministry of environment Marcin Korolec, is sailing a ship through stormy seas: the domestic political base is skeptical about the climate change theory, national politicians are loathe to agree to an ambitious EU target, and the international community has high expectations that Warsaw and the next two COPs, in Lima in 2014 and Paris in 2015, will lead ultimately to a global agreement. Good luck!

v e n tMs I X E R B U S Ie NESS

From left, Ewa Łydkowska, Mateusz Piotrowicz and Sebastian Zimmermann of SwedeCenter

Business Mixer TITLE SPONSOR

Adam de Sola Pool an investor with EIP making remarks on the stage

Photos by KM Ratschka

Business mixer participants during the speed networking portion of the event

ORGANIZED BY

Members of Cleantech Poland. From left Wojciech Kość, editor in chief of Cleantech, Maja Sobieszczak key account manager, Piotr Wdowiński, marketing assistant, Keith Luke key account manager oil & gas, Tobiasz Adamczewski principal analyst, Parker Snyder, director of Cleantech Poland

The magazine was given away at an invite only launch party at the Hilton Hotel.

Mateusz Kruk, United Oilfield Services, coming out for the party

Bing Wang of Solarpraxis making opening remarks for their new solar campaign

www.cleantechpoland.com

| 77

PORTRAIT

By Wojciech Kość p h oto g r a p hy: s z ym o n s zc z e ś n i a k

Marcin Stoczkiewicz Marcin Stoczkiewicz, partner at green law firm Client Earth, can withstand new coal capacity getting built, but won’t accept it getting built if utilities trample on citizens’ rights.

Earth’s a client Am I a Greenie?

I don’t consider myself too much of an active environmentalist, other than what I do for ClientEarth. I have a husky and I love the countryside and that’s about it. I also love Kraków. Kraków is my home. Warsaw is just a workplace. I like how the Kraków people have made local authorities address the issue of air quality in the city, where pollution often exceeds the norm by 800 percent.

Treasure and transformation In Poland, we focus primarily on biodiversity and energy. Polish biodiversity is unique in Europe, it’s a treasure that needs to be protected before it’s wasted. The Polish energy sector is undergoing transformation: from a monopolistic, state-owned coal-based sector to a distributed, privatelyowned model that is going to rely on renewables.

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We’re a law firm that works for what we consider to be important environmental goals. In the broad sense, Earth is our client, but it’s a metaphor, of course. In practical terms, our clients are communities whose rights are trampled on by companies and who stand to benefit if they comply with environmental regulations.

US VS them

We won a case against Kulczyk Investments over the right of local farmers to be included in the EIA procedure for the planned 2000 MW Elektrownia Północ power plant. When we proved that it’s possible to successfully challenge in court the validity of environmental permitting decisions, our activity became suspicious and our work was considered harmful to the public interest. But I think we represent it very well.

The Rospuda breakthrough The breakthrough in our understanding of what environmental law is in Poland came with the Rospuda case. [A project to build an expressway through a Natura 2000 site, halted by the EU in 2007 after a decade of NGO protests].

Before Rospuda, legal environmental issues weren’t anything serious. It was common to carry out EIAs on paper, sometimes postdate, a practice which is altogether unthinkable now.

This is

PORR focuses on sustainability (LEED or BREEAM)

PORR!

- Nimbus - Alma Tower - British Embassy - Galeria Słoneczna - Andersia Business Centre - Poleczki Business Park - Business Garden Poznań - Gdynia Waterfront - The Park - Ogrody Elbląg - Le Palais

Gdynia Waterfront Gdynia Waterfront The project was designed in line with sustainable development principles, and the environmentally friendly solutions to be used here meet the LEED certification requirements.

NIMBUS in Warsaw Intended goal: Applying for LEED Gold certificate A building’s certification became nowadays is a main condition. It relates to all the developer projects of IMMOFINANZ Group. Nimbus has been already recorded in the LEED register but the goal is to receive a Gold certificate. The office building should offer the tenants not only the highest comfort but it should also reduce the negative impacts on the environment. Meeting the requirements of the highest construction standards and applying high quality materials will facilitate the highest effectiveness of the building’s utilization. Reduction of all utility costs as well as energy and water consumption are top priorities.

Nimbus in Warsaw

Modern, international, trailblazing With over 10,000 staff and production output of around EUR 2.9bn (2012), the PORR Group is one of Austria’s largest construction companies and a leading player in Europe. With numerous offices in the home markets Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Poland and the Czech Republic PORR has been involved in realising trailblazing construction projects. Furthermore, PORR is expanding into international markets in the Middle East. PORR’s services cover everything from residential construction through to complex infrastructure projects in every sector of the construction industry. www.porr.pl

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