Latvia would invest in biomethane under proposed introduction of REPowerEU chapter

Latvia has submitted a request to the European Commission (EC) to amend the country's recovery and resilience plan, proposing to add a REPowerEU chapter, according to Latvian news agency LETA.
The REPowerEU chapter includes a reform aimed at promoting the development of renewable energy communities and energy self-generation.
The reform also aims to increase the use of sustainable biomethane.
Two investments will upgrade the electricity grid, which will increase its capacity, digitise it, enhance its security and synchronise it with the European Union's (EU's) network.
The third investment measure aims to increase the share of sustainable biomethane in final energy consumption by establishing a regional hub where sustainable biomethane can be fed into the existing infrastructure through the construction of a regional biomethane entry point.
Latvia also proposes to amend 44 measures included in its plan.
These amendments are necessary because of last year's high inflation and Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine, which disrupted supply chains.
This has led to increased investment costs and delays.
Latvia's allocation under the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) was reduced from €1.9 billion to €1.8 billion. The reduction is linked to the June 2022 update of the RRF grant allocation ratio and reflects Latvia's relatively better economic performance in 2020 and 2021 than originally expected.
However, as the value of Latvia's original plan is lower than the maximum RRF grant allocation, Latvia may still receive additional €8.5 million after taking into account the June 2022 update.
Latvia has requested to transfer part of its Brexit contingency, €10.9 million, to its Recovery and Resilience Plan.
Together with Latvia's REPowerEU allocation of €124 million, the amended plan, including these additional funds, is worth almost €2 billion.
The EC will assess within two months whether the amended plan meets all the assessment criteria set out in the RRF Regulation.