Amendment to Czech renewable energy sources act fixes error that harmed farmers

An amendment to Act No. 165/2012 Coll. on supported energy sources corrects an error under which agricultural entities without exclusively book-entry shares were not eligible for support. Only businesses generating electricity from biogas were exempt. Under the amendment, all agricultural businesses generating electricity from renewable energy sources will be exempt.

Under the 2012 Act on supported energy sources, all joint-stock companies (or companies with a similar legal form) receiving support for electricity generation from renewable sources are required to have exclusively book-entry shares. The purpose of the requirement is chiefly to ensure transparency regarding the owners of power plants receiving support under the act.

Under Section 4(12), the only exception was for producers whose main business activity is agricultural production and which generate electricity from biogas.

The amendment extends the exemption to electricity producers whose main business activity is agricultural production and which generate electricity from renewable sources (not only biogas).

„The government accepts MPs’ efforts to correct an error arising from the incorporation of an amending proposal into the government’s draft bill.“
Annex to the government resolution on the amendment to Act No. 165/2012 Coll.

A similar provision has now been added to Section 6, which concerns support for electricity generation from high-efficiency combined heat and power. It additionally states that „the method for determining agricultural production as the main business activity and the method for maintaining a register of producers whose main business activity is agricultural production shall be laid down by an implementing legal regulation“.

The amendment has already been signed by the President of the Czech Republic and will now be promulgated in the Collection of Laws. The act enters into force upon its publication in the Collection of Laws.

As stated in the government resolution, these provisions contained several errors. One of them was that last year’s amendment inserted a sentence into Section 6, paragraph 8, even though the final paragraph of that section is numbered 7.