Enea power plans no further major acquisitions in RES this year (CEO interview)

"We have completed major acquisitions in the renewable energy sector. We have purchased the best projects on the market; there are no more interesting wind farms or projects in the final stages of development. If the wind farm bill is passed, the investments will still take 5-6 years to complete, because that is how long the preparatory, design and construction period takes," CEO Kinelski told PAP Biznes.

In recent months, Enea has concluded several transactions to purchase renewable energy installations, including a total of 200 MW in wind farms.

The group now wants to focus on its own greenfield projects in the renewable energy segment.

"We are not planning any major acquisitions in renewable energy this year, although we are closely monitoring the market. There are projects available on the market without technical conditions, but we are not interested in them," Enea's CEO said.

"Now we want to focus on our own greenfield projects, which are at various stages of development. We have at least several hundred MW in our portfolio, and we want to launch these installations next year. These will mainly be photovoltaic projects with storage facilities, hybrid installations with storage facilities and wind farms," he added.

Kinelski assessed that new projects will appear gradually.

"Certain areas for investment will open up after the amendment of the wind farm law, but often it is local conditions in the GPZ [main power supply point, a transformer station that supplies the medium voltage network - MI ed.] that will determine the pace of investment," he said.

Enea plans further large investments in distribution networks, wanting to spend several billion zlotys on networks each year, but, as CEO Kinelski pointed out, it is obvious that the increase in the connection capacity of new sources will not be logarithmic.

"This year's reallocation of renewable energy sources will certainly be an important element of investment planning and profitability analysis for investors," Enea's CEO assessed.

"The market for new projects may also be slowed down by repowering, i.e. new wind turbines on old towers, using the existing network infrastructure. This solution will be cheaper and simpler," he added.

Kinelski announced that investments in the Enea group for this year are proceeding according to plan.

"After the first half of the year, performance in the generation segment may be slightly lower than expected, but the plan for the whole year is not at risk," he told PAP Biznes.

"We have assumed capital expenditure of around PLN 8 billion this year, and I expect that we will achieve this," Kinelski assessed.

Enea's CEO pointed out that next year's CAPEX structure will be different.

"In the generation segment, we will have higher expenditures related to the gas project. On the other hand, there will be lower year-on-year expenditures related to the renovation of power units and their greening," he said.

When asked about the group's involvement in offshore, CEO Kinelski recalled that Enea group has a stake in the fifth offshore concession, together with listed power utility PGE.

"I assume that this project will be implemented in the future. Currently, PGE is focused on other offshore projects, and we are not under any pressure either. We will probably start working on this project only when the first offshore projects are ready and the infrastructure is in place," he added.

The CEO of Enea assessed that this year will be very good for the group in financial terms.

"I am optimistic, we are not seeing any negative signals from the market environment, energy prices have stabilised. If we successfully develop mechanisms in the future that will allow us to finance further investments, the coming years look promising," he said.

Enea will pay PLN 264.9 million (EUR 62.3 mln) in dividends for 2024, which translates into a dividend of PLN 0.50 (EUR 0.12) per share.

"As the management board, we would like Enea to pay dividends, because we are a joint-stock company for a reason - to increase the value of the company and share profits with shareholders," CEO Kinelski stressed.

"So, if the conditions for payment are met, if the company can afford it in view of its planned investments, we will recommend a dividend, and the final decision will be made by the general meeting," he added.

pel/ ao/