The truth about incentives to renewable energies in Dominican Republic.

In the following article, we intend to answer the question: Are there incentives to attract investments in the area of ​​renewable energies in the Dominican Republic?

The Law on Incentives to the Development of Renewable Sources of Energies No. 57-07, contains important incentives for the installation and operation of renewable energy projects, we could say that very good incentives, so much so that, when investors and regulators from other countries know about our regulation of incentives to the renewable energies they say that they are very good and very advanced.

However, Law No. 57-07 was published twelve years ago and only in recent years, we have seen projects developed through this law, but in order to not get out of our topic, we will give details about this later.

When we talk about incentives of any kind we must think about a transversal system that allows us to fulfill the objectives for which this incentives are granted, the transversality must encompass all the involved institutions with access to the incentives, the productive processes and in each of the stages of the project, from the moment it is conceived, all its useful life, until its dismantling, all this under the mantle of a legal security that guarantees the transparency of the processes over time.

Regarding this, what can we say about the Dominican Republic?, the truth is we still have a lot to do, on paper we have good incentives but access to them is difficult, the institutions in charge fail to agree in anything, and both the time and the procedures become barriers to these incentives.

On the other hand, we must think about the supreme incentive, the incentive that gives or makes sense to the feasibility of an energy project, we are talking about the purchase price of energy, which is obtained using a PPA, and in the Dominican Republic obtaining a PPA is  not an easy task. (We’ll talk about this later).

So, the answer to the question, In the Dominican Republic do we have any incentives to attract investments in the area of renewable energies? The answer is: On paper, Law No. 57-07, we have incentives for the development of renewable energies, but the system for accessing them is difficult,, we need transparency, legal guarantees and less discretion.

Francisco Ortega, IEC Manager

May 2019