Solar Incentives in Turkey

Last updated: 14 November 2026 · Last verified: 14 November 2026

Turkey’s solar incentive system is in transition. The old YEKDEM feed-in tariff, which underwrote the country’s rise from 40 MW of solar in 2014 to roughly 25.8 GW by January 2026, closed to new projects at the end of 2025. In its place, Turkey is leaning on two newer tools: a 2026 regulatory framework for unlicensed solar once a plant’s YEKDEM term expires, and the YEKA auction system, which now pays developers extra for using Turkish-made equipment. This page tracks what support is actually available today, who qualifies, and what changes are coming next.

YEKDEM: Closed to New Projects, Still Paying Out Legacy Plants

YEKDEM (Yenilenebilir Enerji Kaynakları Destekleme Mekanizması — the Renewable Energy Resources Support Mechanism) is a feed-in tariff created under Electricity Market Law No. 6446. It guaranteed renewable generators a fixed purchase price, in US dollar-linked terms, for ten years from commissioning, with extra “local content” bonuses for domestically manufactured equipment.

The current window of YEKDEM (sometimes called YEKDEM-II) was only open to facilities that obtained a YEK certificate and started commercial operation by 31 December 2025. According to Turkish energy-market reporting on EPDK’s 2025 cost-allocation decisions, YEKDEM’s total unit cost for 2025 ranged between roughly 223.14 and 580.92 Turkish lira per MWh across the mechanism’s technology mix — a cost-sharing figure, not a single per-technology solar tariff. Projects commissioned after the 2025 cut-off no longer qualify for YEKDEM support and must sell into the open market instead.

Plants that already completed their 10-year YEKDEM term face a separate question: what happens to the power once the guaranteed-price period ends. Presidential Decision No. 11415, issued 12 June 2026, answered that for unlicensed (typically rooftop and small distributed) plants: where generation and consumption share the same metering point, all output may still be sold; where they sit at different metering points, only the EMRA-determined surplus qualifies, priced at 90% of the then-current YEKDEM tariff for licensed facilities (capped at the hourly EPİAŞ day-ahead market clearing price). Licensed plants that exit YEKDEM after their 10-year term, by contrast, move to selling directly on EPİAŞ’s day-ahead and intraday markets.

YEKA: Auctions Now Pay More for Turkish-Made Equipment

With YEKDEM closed, new utility-scale solar and wind capacity in Turkey is being allocated mainly through YEKA (Yenilenebilir Enerji Kaynak Alanları — Renewable Energy Resource Areas) auctions, run by the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources under Minister Alparslan Bayraktar. The 2026 round covers 2.4 GW across 21 separate competitions (14 GES/solar, 7 RES/wind): roughly 900 MW of solar across 14 projects in nine provinces, and about 1.5 GW of wind across seven projects in four provinces. The tender notice was published in the Official Gazette on 11 July 2026; applications were accepted on 13 October 2026, 10:00–12:00 local time, at the Ministry’s Central Accounting Directorate in Ankara. The wind (RES) round’s competitive-bidding (yarışma) session took place as scheduled on 2 November 2026, 10:00 local time, covering the Sivas, Balıkesir-1 through Balıkesir-4, Manisa and Kütahya wind sites. Twelve companies had submitted a combined 29 applications across the seven RES sites, according to company KAP disclosures and ministry-cited press reporting. Turkish business press (CNBC-e, Forbes Türkiye, DHA, BloombergHT) reported provisional results for 6 of the 7 sites on 5 November 2026: Metgün Enerji Yatırımları for the 320 MW Sivas site (clearing bid €3.50 cent/kWh plus a €30,000/MW contribution fee), Poyraz Yenilenebilir Enerji for Balıkesir-1 (140 MW, €42,000/MW contribution fee), Egesa Elektrik İnşaat Enerji Üretim for Balıkesir-2 (235 MW, €0/MW contribution fee), Fe Girişim Enerji for both Balıkesir-3 (170 MW, €20,000/MW) and Balıkesir-4 (140 MW, €154/MW), and Ecogreen Elektrik Enerji Üretim for Kütahya (260 MW, €72,000/MW). No winner had been reported for the Manisa site (235 MW) as of publication, and TDE found no Ministry press release confirming any of these results, so they are treated here as media-reported and unconfirmed-by-authority. Across the reported sites, total contribution fees were put at roughly €75.5 million including VAT. The solar (GES) track’s competitive-bidding session also went ahead, on 3 November 2026, covering 11 of the 14 solar sites for a combined 785 MW; Turkish press (BloombergHT, Anadolu Ajansı-sourced reports) said 19 companies took part and reported provisional best-bid results by project, but as with the wind track TDE found no Ministry press release or Official Gazette notice confirming a final winner list, and the handful of secondary reports that named per-project winners disagreed with each other on at least two sites — so no winner names are repeated here. The remaining 3 of the 14 original solar sites were not covered in the reporting found; it is not disclosed whether they were excluded from the round or simply not yet reported on.

The auction sets a ceiling price of €55/MWh for both technologies, with floor prices of €32.5/MWh for solar and €35/MWh for wind, and a guaranteed minimum (contract-for-difference) price of €47.5/MWh. Winning bidders sign a 20-year PPA at their strike price, with guaranteed grid access for five years (solar) or six years (wind) after award.

The incentive layer that matters most for manufacturers sits inside the bid-qualification rules rather than the tariff: solar bidders must source at least 75% of panel value domestically (post-wafer processing), with a 51% threshold for cables, mounting structures, trackers and inverters. Wind bidders need 55 of 125 possible domestic-content scoring points, with a 65% threshold for blades and 51% for towers and generators. Energy Minister Bayraktar has said the round is meant to help Turkey reach its 120 GW 2035 renewable-capacity target early, and has forecast solar becoming the country’s single largest electricity source by the end of 2026.

Who Can Apply?

• Households and small businesses: net-metering/surplus-sale rules under unlicensed generation (up to 5 MW), including the post-YEKDEM surplus-purchase mechanism for plants that have exhausted their 10-year term.
• Independent power producers and utility-scale developers: the YEKA GES/RES-2026 application window closed on 13 October 2026; the next opportunity will be a future YEKA round, including a planned offshore wind YEKA competition whose calendar the Ministry expects to firm up in October 2026, with bidding tentatively seen in the first half of 2027.
• Equipment manufacturers: no direct cash grant, but a structural demand incentive — YEKA’s 75% domestic-content threshold for solar panels effectively requires winning developers to buy from (or build) qualifying Turkish manufacturing capacity, which several market analyses flag as a bottleneck given the limited number of factories currently able to meet the threshold.
• Legacy YEKDEM participants: no new applications possible; existing certificate-holders continue receiving their original 10-year tariff until it expires, then shift to EPİAŞ market sales or the post-YEKDEM surplus mechanism if unlicensed.

What’s Next

Turkish business press reported provisional winners for 6 of the 7 wind (RES) sites on 5 November 2026 and provisional best bids for 11 of the 14 solar (GES) sites on 3 November 2026, but as of 14 November 2026 TDE still found no official Ministry press release or Official Gazette notice confirming either set of results, so both rounds are treated as reported-but-unconfirmed rather than formally awarded. The Manisa wind site’s winner, and the remaining 3 solar sites, have not been reported anywhere TDE could find. EMRA is also still expected to issue secondary legislation clarifying exactly how much “surplus” qualifies for the 90%-of-tariff purchase price under Presidential Decision No. 11415 for unlicensed plants with separate metering points — a detail that affects how much legacy rooftop and distributed solar owners actually earn once their YEKDEM term lapses. Separately, Türkiye signed a 10 November 2026 electricity MoU with Saudi Arabia (via ACWA Power) targeting 5 GW of bilateral renewable capacity, outside the YEKA process but part of the same broader push to scale up domestic generation; see TDE’s coverage of the Saudi-Türkiye electricity MoU. This page will be updated once official YEKA confirmation and the outstanding results are published.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is YEKDEM still open to new solar projects in 2026?
No. YEKDEM’s current window only covered projects that obtained a YEK certificate and started commercial operation by 31 December 2025. Projects commissioned after that date do not qualify and must sell into the open market or compete in YEKA auctions instead.

What replaced YEKDEM for new utility-scale solar in Turkey?
YEKA (Renewable Energy Resource Areas) auctions, which award 20-year contracts-for-difference through competitive bidding rather than a flat feed-in tariff, with domestic-content bonuses layered into the qualification rules.

What happens to solar plants after their YEKDEM term ends?
Licensed plants move to selling power directly on EPİAŞ’s day-ahead and intraday markets. Unlicensed plants fall under Presidential Decision No. 11415 (June 2026), which allows sale of surplus electricity at 90% of the current licensed YEKDEM tariff, capped at the hourly market price.

What is the domestic-content requirement for Turkey’s 2026 solar auction?
Solar bidders in the 2026 YEKA round must source at least 75% of panel value from Turkey (after wafer processing), plus a 51% threshold for cables, structures, trackers and inverters.

When is the next Turkish renewable energy auction?
The 2026 YEKA round, covering 2.4 GW of solar and wind across 21 competitions, closed its application window on 13 October 2026. The wind (RES) track’s competitive-bidding (yarışma) was held on 2 November 2026, with media-reported (not yet Ministry-confirmed) winners for 6 of 7 sites. The solar (GES) track’s bidding was held on 3 November 2026, covering 11 of 14 sites (785 MW); provisional bid results were also reported in the Turkish press but not yet confirmed by the Ministry.

Related The Daily Energy Pages

• Who Supplies Türkiye With Natural Gas? (Who Powers Who? series)
• Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant: Project Tracker
• Saudi Arabia Energy Tenders (Energy Tenders series)
• Saudi Arabia and Türkiye Sign Electricity MoU at COP31

Sources

• EPDK (Energy Market Regulatory Authority) 2025 YEKDEM cost-allocation decisions, as reported by Ekonomi Gazetesi and BloombergHT, 2025
• Presidential Decision No. 11415, 12 June 2026, on unlicensed-generation surplus sales after YEKDEM expiry
• Turkish Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources, 2026 YEKA GES/RES auction announcement and şartname (11 July 2026); coverage by QNB Invest, Gazete Oksijen, Bursa Hakimiyet and Balkan Green Energy News, July–October 2026
• Foreks, “YEKA RES 2026 yarışmaları 2 Kasım’da yapılacak,” 19 October 2026, citing Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources
• CNBC-e, Forbes Türkiye, DHA and BloombergHT reporting on YEKA RES-2026 provisional results, 5 November 2026 (media-reported, not yet confirmed by an official Ministry release found by TDE)
• BloombergHT, Sabah and Anadolu Ajansı-sourced reporting on YEKA GES-2026 provisional results (11 projects, 785 MW), 3 November 2026 (media-reported, not yet confirmed by an official Ministry release found by TDE; per-project winner names conflicted between secondary sources and are not repeated here)
• Mondaq / Turkish legal-advisory coverage of the post-YEKDEM unlicensed framework, 2026
• SurgePV and PV Magazine market analyses of Turkey’s 2026 solar incentive landscape and YEKA domestic-content thresholds

Illustrative image. Photo: kallerna, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons — source