On 1 March, the Polish National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOŚiGW) announced a new programme called KAWKA to reduce the air pollution in cities. KAWKA, which roughly translates as “Removal of low-efficient energy sources supporting the growth and deployment of decentralised renewable energy sources”, has a budget of Polish Zloty (PLN) 800 million (EUR 200 million) and will support a wide range of technologies, such as solar thermal, heat pumps, biogas and combined heating and power plants, until the end of 2013. Eligible applicants are municipalities of towns with more than 10,000 inhabitants, in which the massive use of fossil fuels – especially coal – for space heating has produced high dust pollution levels.
According to NFOŚiGW, 40 % of CO, 18 % of SO and 9 % of NO emissions in Poland come from burning fossil fuels in small heating plants at residential buildings. “KAWKA is going to stimulate Poland’s solar thermal industry”, Janusz Starościk, President of the Association of Heating Appliances Manufacturers and Importers (SPIUG), is convinced. The municipalities will receive grants equal to 90 % of the investment costs. Launched at the beginning of March, the programme will run for 5 years. To minimise administrative burdens, NFOŚiGW is planning only two application periods during this time. The date for the first period has not been published yet.
KAWKA’s budget is almost double the size of NFOŚiGW’s residential solar thermal subsidy scheme, which is thought to support new systems with PLN 450 million (EUR 112 million) over a four-year period between 2010 and 2014. By the end of January 2013, NFOŚiGW had spent 52% (PLN 236 million) of the budget and was planning to allocate another PLN 125 million this year. So far, this residential programme has subsidised 241,000 m2 of collector area.
NFOŚIGW site on KAWKAprogramme:
NFOŚIGW site on solar thermal grant programme:
Marcin Czekanski is a business reporter based in Szczecin, Poland.
The air polution programme ended at the end of 2017. Find information about the scheme in the following table.
|Country / region||Poland|
|Name of programme||KAWKA (Likwidacja niskiej emisji wspierająca wzrost efektywności energetycznej i rozwój rozproszonych odnawialnych źródeł energii = Removal of low-efficient energy sources supporting the growth and deployment of decentralised renewable energy sources)|
|Type of incentive||Investment subsidies|
|Eligible technologies||Solar thermal and among others heat pumps and biogas|
|Applicable sectors||Municipalities with over 10,000 inhabitants (this requirement does not refer to spa towns)|
|Amount||Depends on the project: To be determined by the local divisions of the National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (NFOŚiGW)|
|Maximum incentive||Up to 90 % of the investment value: However, the regional divisions of NFOŚiGW will set the precise regulations.|
|Requirements for system||NFOŚiGW publications have not yet stated any requirements|
|Requirements for installation||NFOŚiGW publications have not yet stated any requirements|
|Finance provider||Narodowy Fundusz Ochrony Środowiska i Gospodarki Wodnej (NFOŚiGW)|
|Total funds||PLN 800 million (EUR 200 million)|
|Funding source||Penalty fees collected through air and water pollution|
|Effective date||28 February 2013|
|Expiration date||31 December 2018|
|Last review of this tabloid||January 2018|
|Contact||Polish National Fund forEnvironmental Protection and Water Management
Programme coordinator: Mariusz Popiołek