Wind energy in Romania

Onshore: from a stalled fleet to a contracted pipeline

Romania's onshore wind fleet, concentrated in Dobrogea, was largely built between 2010 and 2014 and then stalled; only about 330 MW was added in 2025. The CfD scheme changed the arithmetic. Round 1 awarded roughly 1.1 GW of wind across ten projects, round 2 awarded about 1,260 MW to 23 projects at strike prices between EUR 65.17 and 79.5/MWh, and the December 2025 wind-only round cleared about 316 MW at EUR 59.95 to 74.9/MWh. In 2026, 496 MW of wind was connected by 21 August, and the first CfD-backed wind farms moved into construction, several at once under the same developer.

Wind prices moved the opposite way to solar between rounds, rising rather than falling, because bidders would not go below the mid-sixties in euros per MWh. That is a signal about turbine, logistics and grid costs in Romania rather than about the resource, which is strong in the south-east and along the Black Sea coast.

Offshore: the Black Sea framework

Law 121/2024, adopted in May 2024, set the rules for concessioning offshore wind perimeters in Romania's Black Sea waters, and the World Bank published a roadmap for the sector in September 2024. In July and August 2026 the Ministry of Energy proposed three perimeters with a combined capacity of 3.1 GW (one of 1,900 MW and two of 600 MW each) as the first phase, and the government approved the rules governing the concession procedures. The Energy Strategy 2025-2035 targets 3 GW of offshore wind by 2035. No concession tender had been launched at the time of writing; the dates above describe the framework, not a project pipeline.

Grid, delivery and the 2028 deadline

Most CfD-awarded wind projects target 2028 for commercial operation, with a 36-month clock running from contract signature. Transelectrica's area-based capacity allocation, in force since June 2026, matters more for wind than for solar because the best resource is concentrated in a few counties where transmission capacity is already tight. The Romania-Bulgaria-Greece corridor and the new 400 kV Vulcănești-Chișinău line towards Moldova, energised in August 2026, add export routes for south-eastern wind output.

What this means for investors

• Contracted wind (about 2.6 GW across three rounds) is the investable pipeline; offshore is a framework with proposed perimeters, not yet a tender.
• Wind strike prices in the mid-sixties to mid-seventies in EUR/MWh reflect Romanian delivery costs; underwrite EPC and logistics accordingly.
• Grid capacity in Dobrogea and Moldova regions is the gating factor; area-based allocation makes location part of the bid.
• Onshore wind projects that missed the CfD rounds can still pursue PPAs and merchant routes, but with a different risk profile.

Momentum Energy's view

We see onshore wind as the segment where Romania's CfD design has done the most work, converting a decade of stagnation into a contracted pipeline. Offshore is worth tracking, but capital deployed today should be underwritten on onshore projects with a signed CfD and a confirmed connection. We treat the 3 GW by 2035 target as policy ambition until a tender is published.

The view above is Momentum Energy's opinion and is separated from the sourced facts in the tables. It is not investment advice.