On the road to greening economies in Southeast Europe

On the road to greening economies in Southeast Europe: Options for economic recovery and renewables deployment Less than ten years from 2030, countries throughout Southeast Europe (SEE) still have high shares of lignite-fired electricity in the mix, generated by an ageing fleet of power plants. However, the landscape for our energy system is a very dynamic one: The EU adopted a higher emission reduction target for 2030 (-55 per cent compared to 1990) and a target to be climate-neutral by 2050. Zooming into the region, Greece announced to phase out its entire coal fleet by 2028. Clearly, all this is a comprehensive and challenging task ahead of the EU-27. During this online event we discussed opportunities and challenges in the power sector of SEE EU Member States and lay out possible paths forward for Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece and Romania for greening their economies. We focused on options for a green recovery after the devastating effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and for rapidly scaling renewables