Hidroelectrica plans 850m-euro new hydropower plants in 5 years. What has it done in the past 20 years?

Hidroelectrica, the most valuable company in the Romanian state's portfolio, says plans for the next five years target 850 million euros in investments to build new hydroelectric power plants with a 387-MW capacity, half as much as that of a reactor of the Cernavodă nuclear power plant.

The company says it will invest at a twice as fast rate as in the period since the Revolution of 1989, during which time around 800 new MW were installed in hydroelectric power plants. Although the electricity generator hopes things will go faster, the gap between what was built in the 20 years before the revolution and what has been built since is almost impossible to bridge.
According to the Institute of Hydroelectric Studies and Design (ISPH), which has been involved in almost all hydroelectric energy projects in Romania, around 80 hydro-electric plants with an almost 4,500-MW installed capacity became functional between 1969 and 1989, among which Iron Gate I and II, five times more than in the 20 years since the Revolution. Whilst works on a mid-size hydroelectric power plant of around 40 MW now take around four years, Iron Gates I, a 2,160-MW hydroelectric power plant almost equalling the capacity of three Cernavodă reactors, took eight years to complete between 1964 and 1972.