Policy officer
Email: pippa.gallop AT bankwatch.orgTel.: +385 99 755 97 87
Pippa works as Bankwatch Southeast Europe energy advisor, with a specialisation in coal and hydropower in the Western Balkans. She is based in Zagreb, Croatia and speaks English, Croatian and rusty German.
More from Pippa Gallop
Despite this deadly legacy, just two years ago, all the Western Balkan countries except Albania still planned to build new coal power plants. Since then, three out of five have abandoned these plans. The region has split, creating a two-speed energy transition.
The long-running saga of Slovenia’s overpriced Šoštanj 6 coal power plant took a dramatic turn last week when Slovene prosecutors filed charges including money laundering against 12 people and two companies. Meanwhile, in 2018, the Šoštanj power plant as a whole generated a net loss of EUR 58.5 million. Why are nearby Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina – both countries that are planning new coal plants – not learning any lessons?
The global Covid-19 pandemic has stopped neither hydropower companies nor nature defenders from pursuing their goals in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The latest flashpoint is the Neretva basin, where locals and NGOs are resisting construction with blockades and lawsuits.
Non-governmental organisations from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro on Friday submitted a complaint to the Espoo Convention on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s failure to carry out a transboundary environmental impact assessment for a series of dams planned near the Montenegrin border.
In recent years Montenegro was forced to stop granting incentives for renewable energy projects due to public outcry about small hydropower decimating several small rivers and enriching businesses close to the ruling party. Now a new draft Law on Energy looks set to relaunch the incentives scheme. Why haven’t lessons been learned?
