Amendment to the Regulation on Renewable Energy Resource Areas (YEKA)
With the Amending Regulation, Candidate Renewable Energy Resource Areas (“YEKA”) and YEKA contract were redefined and new definitions such as Environmental Impact Assessment (“EIA”) and competition documents were included. The amendment to the Regulation stipulates that if YEKA's are developed by the General Directorate of Energy Affairs (“General Directorate”), current maps, energy potential atlases, measurement data as well as existing and planned grid infrastructure will be used. The Regulation also stipulates that areas deemed suitable will be announced as Candidate YEKA for detailed studies. With the added paragraphs, inquiries will be made before the institutions and organizations to be determined by the Ministry for the announced Candidate YEKAs, or the EIA process will be initiated for the Candidate YEKAs deemed suitable from the announced areas. In this way, the power capacity that can be installed can be determined by considering the available areas within the candidate YEKA.
According to the amendment made to the Regulation, if a Candidate YEKA is deemed to be ineligible or is not declared as a YEKA within 2 years, its status as a Candidate YEKA will be canceled. This period, which was 1 year before the amendment, has been extended with the new regulation.
According to the Regulation, the legal entity entitled to apply for a pre-license had to submit a pre-license application to the Energy Market Regulatory Authority (“EMRA”) within 45 days from the date of signing the YEKA contract. With the Amending Regulation, this period has been changed to 15 days. According to the Regulation, in the event that a YEKA was developed following the YEKA Competition, the legal entities that won the competition were obliged to apply for a preliminary license to EMRA within 45 business days after their YEKA proposals submitted to the General Directorate were approved by the General Directorate and announced in the Official Gazette as YEKA and notified to EMRA. With the Amending Regulation, this period has been changed to 15 days.
In the Regulation, if the penalty amount determined in case of failure to apply for a pre-license was not paid within the 15-day period, the letter of guarantee in the amount of this penalty value would be forfeited. Pursuant to the Amending Regulation, in the event that a pre-license application is not made within the time limit, the YEKA Agreement will be terminated by the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources (“Ministry”) and the letter of guarantee will be forfeited. The Amending Regulation also stipulates that the fees received from the legal entity with whom the YEKA contract was signed under the Specification will not be refunded.
The Amending Regulation stipulates that the specifications of the domestic components to be used in the electrical energy generation facility and the issues related to their production and/or use will be determined in the Specification and that the documents required in the Specification will be submitted to the General Directorate as in the Regulation. In addition, it is also regulated that if the relevant documents are not submitted in due time, the YEKA Contract will be terminated by the Ministry and the collateral will be recorded as collateral.
In addition to the Electricity Market License Regulation, the obligation to fulfill the obligations specified in the Specification has also been added during the license process. According to the Regulation, in the event that it is determined that the domestic components committed in YEKA during the license process are not used during the acceptance phase of the facility, the relevant unit will not be accepted, and the license holder legal entity will be given a written warning to use domestic components in accordance with the Specification. In the event that the negative situation is not remedied within the period specified in the notice and the commitment is not fulfilled, the YEKA Contract will be terminated, and the collateral will be recorded as a deposit, and liquidation proceedings will be initiated directly according to the general provisions. Prior to the Amending Regulation, if the penalty amount determined by the Ministry was not paid within the 15-day period given by the Ministry, the letter of guarantee was forfeited in the amount of this penalty value. With the Amending Regulation, it is also regulated that additional measures to be taken regarding the protection of YEKAs will no longer be implemented by the Ministry, but by taking the opinions to be given by the General Directorate.
This bulletin is prepared by our lawyers Gözde Esen Sakar, Ece Nart and Çağla Şensoy