RES auctions in Russia: Has competition led to a reduction in the costs of projects?

The article is devoted to the efficiency assessment of the main support mechanism for renewable energy sources (RES) development in Russia – the competitive selection of projects followed by the entering of capacity supply agreements (CSA) by investors – in terms of reducing the cost of such projects. The relevance of the study is because the configuration of this mechanism (including organization in the form of an auction, setting the limits on the selection volumes and specific capital costs, based on which investors compete) aims at limiting the costs of RES development in Russia. To achieve this goal based on the analysis of the European Union experience the author developed the methodology for efficiency assessment of competitive selection of RES projects for the first stage of the program (2013-2020, CSA RES 1.0). Accounting for the specifics of competitive selection of RES projects in Russia, to assess the efficiency of this mechanism we checked the dependence of the average discount to the planned capital costs on the competition intensity at the selections and the fulfillment of the plan for the capacity selection. The following results obtained. Firstly, an econometric estimation of the impact of the competition intensity in the selection of RES projects on the average discount to the planned capital costs confirmed that more intense competition in the selection of wind and solar power plant projects led to lower specific capital costs for projects. Secondly, the comparison of the average discount following the results of selections where the selection plan not fulfilled with the average discount flowing the results of selections where the selection plan fulfilled also indicates that higher specific capital costs for projects set at selections with insufficiently intense competition.