Catalin Cepisca, Raiffeisen Bank: “We are open to CfDs, we hope to see as many projects as possible”

“We want to be present in the energy market, but more than that. We are talking about green energy, there are many sources of energy, and we must use them all, but the “green” component is very important from the perspective of the financial sector. We feel and see through the European regulations and the regulations of the financial sector how the entire economy is moving towards “green”.

From next year, all large companies will have a mandatory sustainability report that many large firms already produce. As a bank, we launched the first sustainability report in 2008 and issued the first green bonds and the first sustainability bonds in the Romanian market. We have expertise and experience, and we pass this on to companies,” Catalin Cepisca, Senior Director Energy, Metals and Utilities Department, Raiffeisen Bank said during Green Energy Conference organized by The Diplomat-Bucharest.

“But what does it mean to be “green”? It is not enough to just have green energy. I had a discussion with a manufacturer who wants to build a wind farm, and he asked me if it is green according to the European taxonomy.

What does a developer who wants to build a wind farm have to do so that it can finally be recognized from a taxonomy perspective, that it is aligned. The European taxonomy is the one that describes our ways and that we really have a decarbonized economy.

There are many steps that we go through together and that interconnect the entire economy. It’s not just about the type of energy. PPAs will increase a lot when we have certificates of origin. Because then any company that wants to consume only green energy, and there are a lot of them in Romania, will be able to very simply show consumption only in green energy. And then we will have PPAs very simply. They have increased in the last two years; we are seeing more and more.

But project finance type financings that have PPAs are just now appearing. Why? Because if we do not have these certificates of origin, the construction can be done, but it is much more difficult and then we must also have a company that is an off taker and receives the energy, that has enough know-how or has the desire to have enough know-how , but they specialize their people in a very particular thing.

We estimate that the PPA market will grow, and we expect that next year it will become a counterweight in the financing area for what we have done so far.

We are open to CfD (contracts for difference) auctions, we are waiting for the companies’ plans regarding accessing this instrument. We believe that the future looks good, and we hope to see as many CfDs as possible.”