After getting off to a late start in the energy transition, Poland is making up for lost time.
Over the first seven months of 2024, renewables comprised 30.2% of the country’s electrical output — on par with the global average, and nearly double the levels seen just three years ago, according to data collated by research group Ember.
On the other hand, coal’s share declined to 57.6% over the seven-month period, with the dirtiest fossil fuel hitting a fresh monthly low of 53% in July. As recently as 2022, coal accounted 70% of Poland’s power generation.
The rapid shift in favour of wind and solar energy was prompted, in part, by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent surge in fossil fuel prices.
More recently, the formation of a new government in December 2023, led by centrist prime minister Donald Tusk, has added new impetus to Poland’s decarbonisation drive.
Whereas the previous conservative government aimed to raise the share of renewables in the electricity mix to just 32% by 2030, Tusk is targeting a share of 56% by then, according to a draft update of Poland’s National Energy and Climate Plan.
To get there, his coalition government plans to rely heavily on wind energy — both onshore and offshore — while also steadily increasing solar’s contribution. Developers currently plan to build 5.9GW of offshore wind capacity by 2030, according to Reuters.
However, the prior administration’s tardiness on climate action will complicate things.
After underinvesting in the transmission grid for years, Poland is now seeing a rapid rise in grid connection declines for wind and solar projects.
And Ember analyst Paweł Czyżak recently warned that Tusk’s government isn’t moving fast enough.
“This lack of strategic direction, vision and planning will compromise just transition efforts in coal regions, weaken Poland’s position among neighbours and the wider EU, and slow down the further deployment of renewable electricity,” Czyżak said in a note.
Ember’s modelling suggests that accelerating investments in the grid and renewables would help reduce power prices for Polish households, who currently pay some of the highest rates in Europe.
Yet achieving even the updated target of 50% renewables by 2030 would leave Poland some six years behind the European Union as a whole in the energy transition.
Polish climate and energy research group Forum Energii said recently the country’s energy transition is still largely being driven by market forces and reforms that have removing obstacles for clean energy developers, rather than through a concerted push by the state.
“Changes in the power sector are accelerating, but they are the result of mega-trends and the market, more than a conscious state plan,” said Forum Energii president Joanna Pandera.
The Ministry of Climate and Environment, which is developing a new national energy and climate plan, has an opportunity to fulfil that task and set a clear direction, Pandera says.
Among other things, it’ll need to ensure investments in grid-scale batteries are ramped up to make the power system more flexible, according to the group’s assessment.
A faster transition would curb the need for imported fossil fuels, which account for 43% of the energy consumed in the country.
