ICCI 2016 in Istanbul saw new investment opportunities for wind and solar in Turkey. Zenit Enerji is offering a financing package for rooftop solar as the first Turkish company. BayWa r.e. also plans to enter the Turkish market. A new wind-licensing round will start in June.
Big manufacturers like Siemens, GE, Suzlon, Nordex, Enercon or Goldwind and Turkish companies like Zorlu Energji attracted interest visitors of 24 countries at ICCI 2016, that took place at Expo Center Istanbul. With around 5 GW installed capacity the wind power sector has already reached a higher market level in Turkey. Yunus Isik, sales manager of the Turkish daughter company of Enercon is expecting another big push through the coming new licensing rounds. In June, a licensing round with 3 GW will start, in autumn another round with 2 GW. The goal of the national energy roadmap is to have 20 GW wind power installed by 2023. “We are seeing great potential for our Turkish business and had good customers response at ICCI”, Isik said. With a return on investment of around 15% in the wind sector, Turkey would offer attractive investment conditions, Huseyin Bicer, sales engineer at Nordex Enerji added. Can Güven, Sales Manager Turkey from Leitwind stressed on the interesting business opportunities in the unlicensed wind market.
With an expected growth of 500 MW for 2016, the photovoltaic market is also gaining speed. At the moment around 370 MW are installed. The main focus so far is ground mounted installations and larger rooftop installations. But the residential market and smaller commercial rooftops are also seeing greater customer interest, according to Yonca Kilic, speaker of Zenit Enerji. Under the new daughter company Sunroof Energy, the Izmir-based system integrator just introduced a financing and full-service package for residential and commercial rooftop installations from 2 kW up to 200 kW. The payback period is up to five years and installations are provided by local contractors. “We also widened the range of the systems we are offering”, Murat Veyisoglu, Business Development Manager said. Among them are SMA, Huawei, TBEA, Schneider Electric, Canadian Solar, Solar World, Talesun, Yingli Solar and First Solar.
BayWa r.e. also wants to enter the growing Turkish solar market. “We came here to ICCI to negotiate with potential local distribution partners”, Managing Director Friedhelm Enslin said. According to Giovanni Capussela, General Director of Italian based Greenercom investment conditions in Turkey improved over the last months, due to a new regulation, that enforces project developers to finish their projects before selling. “Turkey is by far the most interesting country in Europe for solar investments”, Capussela said. Ioannis Lysaridis, Country Manager of tracker manufacturer Mecasolar expressed a similar estimation. The Spanish-based tracker manufacturer just finished a 5 MW project with its local EPC partner Seiso.
Another trend this year`s ICCI saw was the increasing number of Iranian solar companies and officials looking for international and Turkish investment partners. “The Iranian wind and solar market is ready to start”, Roberto Cognetti, Chairman of the Board of Tehran-based HG Engineering & Investments said.
Around 14.000 professionals and 279 exhibitors joined this year`s ICCI. This was a little lesser than expected due to the cancellation of several exhibitors especially from China for expected safety problems in Turkey. ICCI 2017 will take place from May 3-5 2017.
